


Who's Keeping Tally, Anyways?

by cheble_king



Category: Fallout 4
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Bigotry & Prejudice, Blood and Gore, Canon-Typical Behavior, Canon-Typical Violence, Derogatory Language, Domestic Violence, Emetophobia, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Eye Trauma, F/F, F/M, Implied/Referenced Cheating, Nate has been renamed 'Richard/Ritchie', Panic Attacks, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Slow Burn, Smoking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-17
Updated: 2020-05-27
Packaged: 2020-10-20 15:51:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 22
Words: 26,885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20677955
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cheble_king/pseuds/cheble_king
Summary: Annie Simeone-Johannes does not like Deacon.He's too cocksure of himself, too foolhardy and aloof, and he lies through his teeth 98.7% of the time, and the remaining 1.3% he's trying to impart some great 'lesson of wisdom' on her (the first time he bullshitted her, she believed it - now she’s smart enough to recognize his tells, recognize that at every lie’s center there’s a grain of truth that holds it all together).He's too loud, a liar and a sleaze… in short, he's everything Ritchie was when they first met; her a budding actress and him a well known actor-producer combination. A recipe for disaster, more like (at least with Deacon, she knows he’s not fucking her costars in their bed.) She has to remind herself, too often for her to feel truly comfortable, that they are two different people, too different to be the same, and yet -Yet still the similarities are chilling.





	1. follow the trail

_ “Wake up, Commonwealth. Synths are not your enemy, they are victims in this war as well. True, they were created by the Institute. But they were created as slaves. Thinking, feeling, and dreaming beings utterly oppressed by their tyrannical masters.” _

_ “...” _

_ “So join with us in fighting the real enemy: The Institute.” _

_ “Join the Railroad.” _

_ “...” _

_ When you’re ready for that next step… don’t worry.” _

_ “We’ll find you.” _

The words fade out and the telltale sound of a holotape ejecting from a Pip-Boy clatters through the night, to which Annie grimaces at as Dogmeat startles awake. She offers him half of her iguana-bits as apology, and it seems it’s received well, as its gone within a second - it's enough to make her laugh, then sober up quickly as the sound of raiders in the distance grows nearer.

Another sleepless night as Annie treks to the Commons, or as she’d taken to calling it, purgatory incarnate.

At least she wasn’t hungry, wasn’t as bony as she used to be - the wastes were never kind to anyone, but the ruined life had been 'nice' enough to give her a steady stream of food, and Annie would be lying if she said she was anything but grateful. The old world had emaciated her, but in this burned out nightmare, she could flourish (she wants to analyze the deeper roots of that, but every time she thinks too hard about it, bile rises to the back of her throat and she has to quickly push the thoughts away).

She shakes her head, stands, and gestures to Dogmeat to follow as she follows her map closer, closer, to the point of finding some answers.

That’s when the first Super-Mutant shouts.

\--

Two minutes into the interrogation with the Railroad, and Annie is already growing impatient.

“Pardon my exclamations, but -” And the falsetto acting drips from her lips as a look of barely restrained annoyance makes itself clear on her face, grimace following soon after, “I just fought my way through not one, but  _ two  _ packs of Super-Mutants, and a pack of ghouls… which were right outside your front door, might I add!”

“Well - it was a-a necessary precau -”

“Precaution my  _ ass,  _ if you’re really so - so  _ adamant  _ about having people join your cause, one would assume you would make sure future recruits don’t die on the way to your base!”

She’s barely constrained ferocity, enough to make the cigarette smoking red-head laugh and the white-haired tank give a smirk of respect - which she  _ likes,  _ sure, but she’s not looking for respect, is she?

Annie feels bad for snapping at them, but being polite doesn’t have a place in this bombed-out world anymore.

“Well, in our holotapes, we did say to -”

She doesn’t hesitate to interrupt, rolling her eyes as she spits the pre-recorded words back at the red-head, “Yes, yes, ‘wait and I will be collected.’ Well, I waited, and it got me nowhere!”

Annie’s quick as a whip, all sharp teeth and angry eyes and perfect makeup, but when a new voice filters through, she stops, stares, and lets her jaw fall slack -

“You’re having a party -”

His voice is accusatory, playful and dangerous, wrapped up into one neat little package. He’s tall and dark haired, and that cheeky grin is the ghost that haunts her dreams, the very same one she saw two hundred years ago.

“- What gives with my invitation?”

It takes all of Annie’s willpower not to reach for the mysterious man up on the podium, to not run her fingers over cheekbones she used to know so intimately, to not cry in relief because  _ maybe this was a nightmare all along -  _ but no. The chin is off, and there’s no mole over the nose.

Not him.

“I’m Desdemona, and I’m the leader of the Railroad. And you,” the red-head trails off as she spots him, the Ritchie look-alike that’s probably a byproduct of the Institute screwing her again. In the back of her mind, Annie realizes that being the leader means being the strongest - which she can respect, but not trust.

There’s only one way you get power in this world, and it's not by election; trusting Desdemona that easily would only spell misfortune for Annie.

“Deacon. You’re… late. I need intel,” Desdemona looks to the newest addition to their little meetup, eyebrows raising and a look of mild distaste clouding her features.

“Hey, boss, news flash! This chick - she’s the one who took out  _ Kellogg.  _ By the way -” Deacon, the man, turns to Annie, who stares on, vaguely unimpressed. Anyone can kill a merc if they huff enough Jet and pop enough Buffout. The side effects though… those she could’ve done without.

“The Railroad owes you a crate, hell, a truckload of Nuka-Cola for what you did to Kellogg. He was our public enemy  _ numero uno.” _

“So you’re vouching for her?”

“Yes. Trust me - she’s someone we want on our side.”

“That… changes things. Welcome to the Railroad, stranger.”

\--

Deacon was most definitely  _ not  _ Ritchie, Annie made sure of that quickly.

“Deacon, yes?”

“That’s the name, don’t wear it out.” His reply is loose - easy. Friendly, even. It startles Annie back to a period where she’d make egg salad for ‘Football Fridays’ and relax with the other housewives.

A shake of her head is enough to dispel that - that, and the familiar twinge of her scar, eyelid twitching as she absentmindedly runs her fingertips over the marred, angry flesh.

“Are you a synth?” Annie’s bluntness catches both of them off guard, to the point where she covers her mouth hurriedly, apologizing silently - then, outwardly, “Sorry, sorry, terribly forward of me, I know - you just look… you look terribly like someone I know. Pardon me.”

Annie’s gone before he can react, out the door and into the crypt with a long groan of embarrassment.

“Annie, you great big  _ idiot,  _ just  _ what  _ were you thinking?” A fist finds her hairline, tangles in blood-flecked blonde hair and runs back until it hits the ribbon keeping the whole ordeal in place, “You - you can’t just ask people if they’re…”

_ If they’re what?  _ Her mind supplements, willing and waiting and  _ wanting _ to prolong her discomfort.

_ If they’re not real? _

A wave of her hand, dispelling cloying clouds of thought, and she grimaces, removing the ribbon and smoothing out her curls with a shaking hand, “God, you’re such a wreck, Annie. Where’s that moviestar bravada when you need it, huh?”

\--

Annie Simeone-Johannes does  _ not  _ like Deacon.

He's too cocksure of himself, too foolhardy and aloof, and he lies through his teeth 98.7% of the time, and the remaining 1.3% he's trying to impart some great 'lesson of wisdom' on her (the first time he bullshitted her, she believed it - now she’s smart enough to recognize his tells, recognize that at every lie’s center there’s a grain of truth that holds it all together).

He's too loud, a liar and a sleaze… in short, he's everything Ritchie was when they first met; her a budding actress and him a well known actor-producer combination. A recipe for disaster, more like  (at least with Deacon, she knows he’s not fucking her costars in their bed.) She has to remind herself, too often for her to feel truly comfortable, that they are two different people, too different to be the same, and  _ yet - _

Yet still the similarities are chilling. 

Deacon is bald (Ritchie was decidedly  _ not _ ), broad-shouldered, and his voice is too much like her dead husband's; cold gravel and sadness (but at least with Deacon, Annie knows it's not a sympathy pull with the press).

Deacon's got the same high cheekbones and three day old stubble, and the same strong jawline that made Ritchie such a hit with the other female leads  (that and how willing he was to let his pants drop, Annie thinks, with a bitter taste in her mouth.)

Deacon’s mouth is - is a creature in its own right, but Annie tries not to focus on it in a kinda-sorta-personal way, striving to think of it as something… alien. Foreign. Thick lips and a silver tongue, and always with that damnable smirk; Ritchie wore his as a mask, what better way to hide the aging than Botox and a ‘sexy’ smile?

There's too many similarities for Annie, to the point of mistaken identity. Every time she slips and calls Deacon 'Dick' she tries, oh, she tries so hard to play it off like a joke, but she knows he sees right through her flimsy facade. He chooses not to comment (usually) which she takes as a small mercy, the universe giving her a small respite from the exhaustion and horrors of this new, strange world she’s been thrust into.

Annie does  _ not  _ like Deacon.


	2. giants among us

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Missions gone wrong, rights for wrongs.  
Annie gets into a scrape and receives her codename.

Annie’s first mission is given to her by PAM, a simple task according to the repurposed Assaultron; clear out an outpost so that the Railroad can have a place for more synths to stay (before the wipe, whatever that is).

Annie soon comes to learn that ‘simple’ for PAM is more like her ‘moderate,’ or just verging on ‘hard.’

Or maybe ‘harder,’ in the current situation, what with the raiders pinning her to the floor and Deacon _ god _knows where.

“So - you’s thought you coul’ jus’ sneak up an’ take this place back, din’cha?”

The voice of the one she assumes is the leader of the merry band of fuckheads is such an off-putting representation of New York that Annie can’t help but laugh, eyes bright and mirthful even when the man kicks her hard enough she feels something _ crack _and blood bubbles up and through her clenched teeth.

Her breathing is staggered, her rib is probably _ bruised, _and yet Annie still laughs, snarling through bloody lips and wild ferocity - she’s just acting out another scene, she tells herself. Just another scene.

“Yes, actually - I thought I would come up here, and put a bullet through your skull - would you like me to demonstrate?”

The raider’s laughter is harsh, filled with malice and vitriol as he stalks around her until he’s behind her, pressing the heel of his boot into the back of her head - a suggestion of what he could do with her tied down like this.

Too bad for him, she’s gotten out of _ much _worse scrapes than this, and her Pre-War mannerisms won’t be enough to save him from her wrath once she’s out of her confounded restraints.

“So - who sent’cha?”

“Your mom. She sends her regards.”

Her retort earns her another swift kick in the ribs, and Annie can’t help but groan, scrunch her eyes up tight as she takes the chance to sneak the knife she keeps in her boot up into her sleeve with deadly precision.

The real trick is getting herself _ free, _getting herself out of the absolute mess she’s made, all without dying (what a conundrum, the voice of Ritchie whispers in her ear).

She doesn’t know how long they laugh at her, take turns fiddling with her guns, poke and prod and then grow tired, leaving her tied up and exhausted in the middle of their camp, too far from the fire to be warm, yet too close to be cold.

It feels like hours, maybe days, pass before she gets some food and the raider boss spits on her face when she tries to take a finger off of him, laughing as she cringes in disgust.

She’s got the advantage now, because he doesn’t notice how the ropes that bind her are loose and frayed, and how she could barely keep the smile off her face.

The next time the bastard makes to kick her, she yanks her wrists free and slices him open, his blood like cherry grenadine and bad special effects in the fading light of sunset. Annie turns as she hears a yell, the chem-freak who thinks she’s invincible under the haze of Buffout and Jet lurches forward like she’s _ possessed _and with a wicked straight-razor aimed directly at Annie’s throat. (She handles this with ease, ducking low and jamming her fist into the raider’s trachea, unflinching and angry), which sets off the lover whose heart breaks a little more with every wheezing, dying breath of the junkie.

Annie heaves a breath, nearly crying out at the pain in her side doubles as one of the raiders comes at her from behind, grapples her arms behind her back as his partner comes ever closer, wicked, sadistic grin doubled in her spinning vision, and Annie almost wants to give up.

It would be so _ nice _ to just let it all go, to give up and die and see Ritchie once more - so easy, so _ weak _of her.

She clenches her teeth and twists, fat tongues of fire scorching her arm as she rolls them both into the fire, and she rises once more, from the flames reborn (her arm is on fire, but for some reason it just feels _ cold). _

She’s got a pipe pistol in her left hand now, clenched tight as she lets the bullets fly, wincing every time she jostles around, grimacing every time she has to move - and before she knows it, it’s over, the embankment quiet, save for the dying breaths of the unfortunate few who hadn’t been killed upon impact.

Distantly, Annie realizes this is massacre and if her old co stars could see her now, they’d be appalled - but something’s on _ fire _ and she’s breathing so _ hard _ and she can’t do anything except stand there amongst the carnage and just _ breathe, _ happy to be alive and happy to have _ won. _

Deacon shows up a day later, sent to collect her after her absence grew too long for HQ to be comfortable, to pretend that she was probably okay and just nursing her wounds somewhere. She’s sitting, numb, on the steps of the main bunkhouse, and still covered in blood and sweat and her hair is matted to hell and back (she flinches when he waves his hand in front of her face, an involuntary reflex from so many years ago).

One look at her arm and Deacon’s emptying out his pack, scrambling for a Stimpack to jam into the cracked and blackened flesh - Annie can’t find it within herself to care about the pain, to care about the way he tilts her head so he can look her in the eyes, whatever lighthearted joke he had prepared dying on his lips as big, fat tears flow freely down her gristle covered cheeks.

The raiders are gone, buried behind a struggling shrub, and her hands are raw - Deacon cracks strained jokes the whole way back, falling silent when she fails to respond.

(Neither of them acknowledge it when Annie stumbles, when she needs him to help her walk back without collapsing.)

\--

Carrington is _ furious _when he sees her, berating Annie for ‘letting her guard down’ and ‘wasting his supply of Med-X.’

Annie can’t be bothered to care, nursing her injuries in the back of the crypt, listening to Tinker Tom’s outlandish theories in a muted, quiet sort of way - it’s only when he turns to her with an excited look that she seems to awaken from her fugue state.

“So - Codename. You have one now, right?”

“A codename? No - I’ve only worked for you all for, what, three days? Sorry again for -”

“- A week, but anyways, no worries, it’s fine, it’s fine! Super mutants are some _ reaaaaaal _bastards, I can’t blame you -”

“- but still -”

“ - really, no, it’s fine, but hey we should probably -”

“- it was really rather rude of me -”

“ - tell Dez and get you a codename!”

Annie mulls it over for a moment, pursing her lips with a look of deep contemplation, before nodding solemnly, to which Tom goes all starry-eyed and giddy and grabby handed, motioning excitedly for Desdemona to come over to them.

“Dez - Dez, the greenhorn ain’t got a name yet, c’mon, she’s not really Railroad until she’s got one, right?”

“I… suppose,” Desdemona nods, hesitant, before looking down at Annie (she feels so _ small _compared to Desdemona, the woman is a giant, mythical).

“Do I have to pick anything in particular?”

“We usually have a set of free ones, but I’m interested in what you can think up.”

Another pause between them, and Annie breathes gently, rubbing at her ribs (unbroken, just her luck) with a nervous smile.

“How about… Charmer?”

“Good to meet you, Charmer.”


	3. give and take

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The game continues, and Annie is still losing.

Two weeks after joining the Railroad and Annie’s still scrambling for the caps to just  _ survive  _ this irradiated hellscape; Rad-Away, Rad-X, Stimpacks, and every little thing that’ll keep her alive and breathing through that irradiated nightmare (Trashcan Carla’s given her the best offer, 2000 caps for twenty of each).

All she wants is her  _ son  _ and yet  _ still  _ the Commonwealth seems determined to do everything in its power to keep them apart. Between the radiation fueled monsters and the wayward raiders, she’s lucky to be sitting up in the tower of the Old North Church, nursing a bottle of Gwinnett Stout with the wig sporting man she’s decided to tromp about the ‘Wealth with.

So when Deacon offers to help, she’s just desperate enough to take his offer (even though she shouldn’t - shouldn’t be offering up so much information, so many tidbits and details about who she  _ is,  _ what she  _ wants - _ )

“What’s your idea, then, Mr. Fox?” He doesn’t get the joke, and that’s fine with Annie. For a man who claims to read  _ Proust  _ and  _ Shakespeare  _ and to be a connoisseur of Pre-War information, he’s rather sparse on his knowledge of the classics.

“Cabot House has been… asking around, via a guy named Edward Deegan,” Deacon’s face twists up into an approximation of Old World posh and glamour, affecting a terrible English accent to top it all off, “My  _ dearest  _ Antoinette, I, Edward Deegan -”

Annie gently smacks Deacon’s arm with a soft laugh, shaking her head in bemused annoyance, “It’s not  _ Antoinette,  _ Deacon. Just Annie - please, I don’t eat  _ that  _ much cake.”

As expected, the joke flies over his head, and Annie laughs once more, sweeping her hair back into its perfect poodle skirt style, “Old humor, old humor - I’ll tell you sometime. Now, what were you saying about Mr. Deegan?”

He pouts (he’s so  _ childish,  _ her mind quips) for a moment, before that breakaway smirk comes back in full shine, “We travel to the Cabot House -”   
“Yes?”

“- we talk to Edward -”

“And then?”

“- and then we  _ improvise. _ ”

An exasperated sigh cuts through the crisp night air, a puff of crystallized oxygen belying her soft annoyance, eyes rolling at his fun, devil-may-care tone, “Deacon, perhaps we can keep it, ah, concise and short next time, perhaps? Maybe?”

He’s all laughter and sharp teeth, sunglasses like a second pair of eyes in the moonlight as he falls back into his chair, and Annie can’t help but join him, a barely suppressed snort startling her into even more laughter.

“Lord, Deacon - and here I thought  _ you  _ were the serious one.”

She takes a long drink of the Gwinnett, watches as Deacon lights up a cigarette and takes a long breath, the flare of orange highlighting the soft wrinkles that etch over his cheeks, that peek out from behind mirrored sunglasses. A smile curves up on her cheeks, barely there yet still honest, open. 

A rare moment of peace between the two of them, between her and the dangerous environment of Boston.

Annie pulls close, close enough she can almost feel his breath on her skin, and snags the cigarette from his lips, cheeky grin and the old charm of her fifth movie ( _ A Spy in London) _ glittering in her cunning eyes.

She takes it, brings it to her lips and takes a drag, soft and fluttering and the rush of nicotine makes her limbs tingle, settles deep in her chest and curls up, content. Annie opens her eyes after a moment, and laughs inwardly at his open mouthed look of silent surprise - open, close, open, like a fish on land. The laugh bubbles up, falls through her lipstick lips and for a moment she can pretend it’s 2078, and she’s just having a smoke with Ritchie.

But it’s not Ritchie she’s smoking with, is it?

The confidence stalls, sputters and dies, and she nervously returns the half gone cigarette to his mouth, fingertips catching on chapped and cracked lips as she settles back in her chair, hands clasped together so she can hide the shaking of her nerves, “Thank you, Deacon.”

“It’s, uh,” Deacon shakes the stupor away, and Annie drowns the sour twist of her mouth in the even more so sour taste of the Gwinnett, “It’s fine.”

It’s like he doesn’t seem to notice that he’s tearing her apart.

\--

“Deacon,” Annie’s voice catches as she snags Deacon’s sleeve, pulling him off to the side, far enough away from the other Railroad members that they can’t be heard, “I want to - to tell you something.”

“Yeah?”

“I -”

She has to pause, take a moment and breathe as the emotions bubble up and over and threaten to overwhelm her, “I’m not… who you think I am - just, hear me out, alright?”

Deacon’s stature stiffens and Annie can’t  _ bear  _ to look at him, so she fixes her eyes outwards, ready for the judgement, the mocking -

“I was, uh, frozen. In time. That’s why your whippersnapper, your - your youth jokes are so funny to me. I’m from before the bombs - and I know how it sounds, how… how  _ ridiculous  _ it all is, but it’s true.”

“I…”

“That’s - listen, I wasn’t the only one in the Vault. My - my husband. Richard,  _ Ritchie,  _ was there. Kellogg… well, he’s the reason I’m the only one from the Vault left. But - that’s not all.”

She clenches her fists in the fabric of her shirt, bites down the impulse to cry and shout in despair as she thinks of her son.

“My son -”

“- Charmer -”

“- no, no, just - that’s why I speak so strangely. That’s why I… am the way I am. I just - I wanted you to know, because for some  _ odd  _ reason, I trust you.”

She pats his arm with a gentle smile, tears sitting pretty in the corners of her eyes as he gives her a look that, if it was 200 years ago and she still had confidence, Annie would’ve described as  _ tender. _

“Thank you for hearing me out, Deacon.”

Another lingering touch between them as he flicks her nose with a chuckle, “Hey, I’d be a pretty shitty partner if I didn’t listen to you.”

Words unspoken, a question in the air, and when she nods, its with a note of finality - then they both make their way over to Tinker Tom, who’s been pretending not to listen in for the past two minutes and undoubtedly has some new tech he needs acquired, another pit-stop on their way to the infamous Cabot House.

\--

Four days on the road and two staying at the Dugout Inn and Annie realizes she’s been keeping a silent tally in her head, counting  _ who  _ learns  _ what  _ about the other on their journeys. It’s stupid, she  _ knows  _ it’s stupid, but its something that brings a smile to her face either way.

It’s a little game they play (she plays, she doesn’t know if Deacon’s even  _ aware  _ of it, but then again, he’s sharper than a raider’s switchblade,) like Truth or Dare, or even Twenty Questions.

It’s rather enjoyable, in a strange way.

(Annie’s losing; she’s got melancholy, anger, lying and stress down pat. Deacon’s only got false joy and fronts, embarrassment and annoyance - maybe honesty, but that one doesn’t count in her book.)

“What’s got you all smile-y,  _ Charmer?”  _ Her Railroad codename is something to be admired, she thinks, it’s on the nose and true to a fault at times.

_ Charmer -  _ how apt indeed, considering her background.

Annie pulls herself from her thoughts with a wave of her hand, shakes her head with a soft chuckle at Deacon’s inquisitive nature, “Nothing, nothing. Just thinking about how I’d kill for a hot shower. A cold shower, even. Bloatfly guts must’ve gotten in my hair last time around.”

“What, too posh to scum it up with the rest of us?”

He’s teasing her, obviously, from the way his nose scrunches and his shoulders wiggle, and Annie can spot his trademark smirk curling up on his face like a wisp of smoke. 

She laughs as she smacks his arm, popping the collar of her scavenged coat, “Deacon, I am actually wearing a dead man’s clothes currently, please. And here I thought you had me held in a better opinion - Here, hold these for me, will you? I want to clean off.”

Deacon nods, hands outstretched and hips jutted off to the side (he’s old, that’s for sure. Old school, what with the chivalry and whatnot,) “Hey, as long as you don’t treat me like a footlocker, I’ll hold anything you need.”

She can feel his eyes tracking her movements as she holds her gun out to him, a simple .44mm (it used to be Kellogg’s, it’s only fitting that it’s  _ hers  _ now,) her shotgun, her sniper rifle - he looks like a pack brahmin, which brings another laugh to her lips, “Have any of your face swaps included animals? You do brahmin a real service, Deacon.”

“Har-de-har, you’re so  _ funny  _ Annabelle.”

“It’s not Annabelle, Deacon. Just ‘Annie.’ Or ‘Charmer,’ as you’ve taken to calling me,” Annie’s laughter is light, carefree. She can pretend that she’s just in a shitty motel with a coworker, not that she’s calling the Dugout  _ bad,  _ it’s just… new world, with too many new things to get acclimated to.

She shakes her head again as she steps back to the bathroom, shedding layers as she goes (modesty still intact, though. Pre-War values are hard to unlearn).

It’s very intimate, what she’s doing, talking with Deacon as she cleans off. The door doesn’t quite fit in the frame, more of a half door if anything - it makes her nervous, makes her afraid of how comfortable she’s getting with him.

(Makes her wonder if she should hate herself for getting so comfortable.)

“I’ll be out in a moment, okay? Don’t get into any trouble.”

“Me? Trouble? You’re kidding.”

“Oh, I  _ never  _ kid, Mr. Deacon.”


	4. old world ideals

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annie can't stop seeing ghosts, so aliens aren't that strange.

“Tell me - do you believe in life among the stars?”

Jack Cabot is a man from _ her _time, ancient yet youthful, and for a moment Annie worries that he’s a synth (but Gen-3s didn’t exist in the 2070’s, so that theory is out the door). But that doesn’t matter, because they’re offering 300 caps for a simple find and return mission, and that’s 300 caps closer to her goal.

“I believe - I believe that we cannot be the only intelligent life, statistically, so… perhaps?” Annie chooses her words carefully, she can’t afford to screw this up - can’t afford to alienate (poor choice of words) her probable employer.

Deacon’s snort rings through the pristine house, out of place in scavenged clothes - Annie shoots him a dirty look, before turning back to Mr. Esteemed Jack Cabot and using her most winsome smile, something like when she played the part of Ophelia in Hamlet all those years ago (Deacon will never know this, he would tease her to the point of oblivion).

“Tell me, what do you need, Mr. Cabot?”

“Jack, please - it is… something. A courier was killed while delivering a…” Jack Cabot hesitates, bites his lip and fiddles with the buttons of his lab coat before continuing onwards, “While delivering something for me. Raiders ambushed him - now, this is a delicate operation, with private, personal items, so I will need you to -”

Edward cuts him off, placing a reassuring hand on his shoulder and Annie enjoys the output of love from them both. They are in love, make no mistake, and love is… hard - Annie hopes she can see the two be happily wedded at some point (her brain soon returns her from her old world musings, there’s no time for marriage or any of the pomp and circumstance in this new, dark, destroyed world).

“Secure the package, bring it here, await your next assignment. Easy enough?”

“Yes, I assume it will be, thank you Mr. Deegan, Mr. Cabot.”

“Head up to Parsons, speak with the guard. Go from there.”

Annie is halfway out the door before Edward’s done speaking, barely tamped down ferocity evident in her actions.

(Point to Deacon, now he’s got her drive.)

\--

Parsons is, in a word, ruined.

The walls are rotted, the floorboards creak, and there are skeletons everywhere you look. (Though Annie appreciates Deacon’s little joke about the ones plastered in a circle. It made her laugh and that’s what she _ needed _when the ruins of her old life became so real.)

“This place is so…”

“Haunted?” Annie offers up, quickly unholstering her gun at the sound of footsteps above them.

“No,” Deacon clicks his tongue, looking around and chuckling at her jumpiness, “I would’ve said quiet. For an apparent ‘raider band,’ there’s a distinct lack of chem fueled yelling. Or murder. Or any of the other tells.”

“Mhm,” Annie nods, before scoping out another room. It is too quiet, usually old, abandoned places like this would be just _ crawling _with raiders, like an Old World ant infestation.

Or at least it _ was, _ up until the point some crazed junkie falls from the ceiling, laughing and yelling and it takes about two seconds for Annie to pistol-whip him and put a bullet through his skull, eerily reminiscent of how Kellogg murdered her husband all those months ago. The blood splatters across her face, and she rubs at her eyes with the back of her hand, smearing mascara and tissue around without a care in the world (except for when she lets out a huff of annoyance upon realizing she has to wash her hair _ again). _

“Looking _ good _there, Charmer,” Deacon’s sarcasm drips like the blood off the tip of her nose, and she rolls her eyes with a slight scowl, rifling through the dead man’s pockets for spare caps.

“What was that about it being _ ‘quiet,’ _Deacon?”

“Alright, alright, you got me - so, how are we playing this?”

Annie takes a moment to think, wipes her hand on her pants and sighs as she realizes it’s going to stain, “Loud. And hard - they’re raiders, and if we do this right, we can intimidate them…”

“...Or? I’m sensing an ‘or’ here, Charmer.”

“_ Or, _I can live up to my codename, if worst comes to worst.”

“Fine by me.”

“Then shall we?”

“I will be treble-sinewed, hearted, breathed, and fight maliciously; for when mine hours were nice and lucky, men did ransom lives of me for jests; but now I'll set my teeth and send to darkness all that stop me,” Deacon quips, laughter on every lilt of his voice and finger guns in Annie’s direction.

“William Shakespeare, how appropriate.”

“Well, you know me. Only the best from Deacon.”

\--

An hour and a half later and they’ve got the serum in hand, approximately 300 caps scavenged from the corpses of raiders, and Parsons is finally clear. (Annie briefly wonders what Travis will say on the radio, the nervous host always makes her laugh with his recounting of her exploits.)

“So, back to the Cabots? Or do you want to end this with yet _ another _quote - you do so love to quip, Deacon,” Annie can hardly keep the disinterested look on her face, and her voice cracks with the giggles she can barely restrain - Deacon is quick to pick up on this (as always,) and gestures to the ruined exterior of the creamery with a flourish.

“We cannot fight for love, as men may do; we shou'd be woo'd, and were not made to woo.”

“Ah, another Shakespeare quote - you do so love him, don’t you?”

“He has a certain way with words - don’t tell me you don’t like him?”

“We had to read his works for school, I can guarantee I don’t… hate him, per se, just fed up with his importance. Or I was.”

“Huh,” Deacon muses, nodding, as Annie uses a spare set of long johns to clean off her face, “Seems like the dream, if you ask me.”

“Focus more on your desire than on your doubt, and the dream will take care of itself,” Annie offers up with a cheeky grin, reveling in how his face lights up in recognition.

“My, my, my,” he raises his eyebrows (ginger, and he has freckles too, she thinks - it’s hard to tell in the sickly green light of her Pip-Boy. She bites her lip and wonders if he sunburns easily, just like her,) “Mark Twain? I never took you for a scholar, Charmer.”

“I’m many things Deacon. You’ve just yet to find out.”

With that, she starts walking back to the Cabot House, Deacon matching her stride, step for step and still spouting little factoids and questions all the time.

\--

“Check the Third Rail,” Jack’s soft, demure voice calls after Annie and Deacon as they leave the threshold of the immaculate home. His wheedling tone is almost reminiscent of her old stunt director, and Annie can’t be bothered to hold back her laugh, which grows louder upon the sight of Deacon’s confused demeanor.

“Nothing, nothing. Just remembering things.”

“One of these days, you’ll have to let me in on the joke.”

To that, Annie rolls her eyes playfully, looks away when she realizes she’s getting too familiar with a man she’s known for approximately three weeks (or longer, or less - the days blend together).

She shouldn’t be so friendly with a man who’s too much like her dead husband.


	5. blowing smoke

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A rescue mission gone right - or maybe that's just the music talking.

_ Goodneighbor -  _ their next stop. Annie’s never been there, couldn’t risk going through the more dangerous parts of Boston.

She’s glad for Deacon at her back, picking of super mutants and rabid dogs before they have the chance to get to her. (In the back of her mind, she wonders if he’s glad that  _ she’s  _ there, leveling raiders with a single shot of her .44 or a swing of her nail studded baseball bat.)

She usually  _ wouldn’t  _ risk going to Goodneighbor, but the Third Rail was her best lead on Emogene Cabot - and Deacon had a surprise for her, which made her wary. (Annie trusted Deacon, sure, but surprises were hardly ever good in this bloody, violent world.)

Annie sighs as she thinks about  _ what  _ Deacon could be planning - she’s half tempted to just ask him what it is outright, and she’s still debating her decision when she opens the door to Goodneighbor, and is promptly accosted by an unsavory looking character.

He’s got mashed lips, like he’s been punched in the mouth one too many times, shifty eyes that just  _ gleam  _ with hunger, and his nose is decidedly broken - but the worst part?

The worst part is that he reminds her too much of her old manager, Reggie.

“Hey - Hold up there. First time in Goodneighbor?” His voice is ragged, rough from too many cigarettes. He’s like a sleazy, greasy, Pre-War car salesman, if car salesmen carried 9mm on their hips and wore clothes that smelled of old blood, “Can’t go walking around without  _ insurance.” _

“In-Insurance?”

Annie can  _ feel  _ a wave of worry roll off Deacon - she  _ never  _ stutters,  _ never  _ hesitates, and most of all,  _ never shows fear.  _ But the memories are nearly too strong, strong enough that it brings an acrid taste up the back of her throat and she clutches Kellogg’s pistol -  _ her  _ pistol - tighter.

(She should probably be disgusted that she finds comfort in her husband’s killer’s weapon, but the fact she doesn’t is arguably even worse.)

“That's right. Insurance. Personal protection, like - you hand over everything you got in them pockets, or ‘accidents’ start happenin' to ya. Big,  _ bloody _ , ‘accidents.’” 

Annie’s frozen, she’s struggling to breathe and this man is so  _ close  _ to her and he smells like  _ death,  _ smells like the locker room she got -

“Whoa, whoa. Time out - someone steps through the gate the first time, they're a guest. You lay off that extortion crap.”

_ \- she can’t  _ ** _breathe _ ** _ can’t  _ ** _think _ ** _ can't  _ ** _survive this _ ** _ the knife is  _ ** _pressing _ ** _ into her  _ ** _skull _ ** _ and everything - _

“What d'you care? She ain't one of us.”

_ \- hurts so  _ ** _bad _ ** _ hurts so  _ ** _much _ ** _ she's ruined shes broken he’s  _ ** _killing her _ ** _ and - _

“No love for your mayor, Finn? I said let her go.”

_ \- no more no more no more she  _ ** _can’t _ ** _ do this  _ ** _won’t _ ** _ do this again please no she  _ ** _can’t _ ** _ - _

The sound of a knife slicing into soft flesh brings her back to herself, the _'thump' _of the man’s body hitting the pavement lets her think and compartmentalize, and the sight of the revolution-era clothed ghoul offering her a wicked grin as he pockets the still bloody knife breaks her fully from her reverie. Annie takes a stuttering breath as her heart’s rhythm steadies and her lungs stop burning, presses the heel of her palms into her eye sockets before looking back up at the man.

(Ghoul.)

Annie meets his dark, glittering eyes and gives him her most winsome smile, hoping,  _ praying,  _ that she doesn’t look as pathetic as she feels.

“You okay?” He’s surprisingly kind, and the radiation burns on his throat can’t be too bad, because his voice is still soft and sweet, with just a hint of Jet-burn on his tongue.

“I - yes. I’m fine. Thank you for taking care of him, Mr. …?” Annie extends her hand for a shake, and the ghoul looks almost surprised, before clasping it with a hearty laugh and a firm grip (she forgets too often that handshakes aren’t a common greeting anymore).

“Hancock. Mayor Hancock - Now don't let this incident taint your view of our little community, Goodneighbor's of the people, for the people, you feel me? Everyone's welcome.”

“Sounds like anarchy,” Annie smiles, rolling the name around in her head a couple times.

_ Hancock. _

So fitting, considering his clothing choice. (She briefly wonders if they’re John Hancock’s original clothes, but who knows anymore?)

“The best kind of anarchy. Embrace it, and maybe one day you'll call this little slice of chaos home… so long as you remember who’s in charge.” With that, Hancock saunters off, with a nod to someone who is, undoubtedly, his bodyguard, leaving Annie still shaking imperceptibly and Deacon - well, she can’t tell what Deacon’s doing, because if she looks him in the eye right now?

She’ll break.

\--

It’s her false confidence that makes her fit into Goodneighbor, the easy way she jokes with the other drifters and the way she strides purposefully into the Third Rail, winking at Ham and leaving the old ghoul shell-shocked and tongue-tied, stumbling over the words Hancock told him to say and grinning as she doesn’t recoil at his touch.

“Thank you Ham!” Her voice carries up the stairs as she skips down them, laughing as Deacon struggles to keep up - it’s sweet, in a way.

(It would be sweeter if her shoulders would stop shaking, if her heart would stop beating right out of her chest.)

When she reaches the bottom, she’s transported back 200 years by the soft crooning of a jazz singer and the slow, steady beats and neon lights of a dive bar - if not for the clothing and ghoulification around her, she could believe that she was at the set of  _ A Last Dive in the Sea,  _ waiting for her makeup to set and the latex fins she wore to properly stick.

A red sequin dress, her heart beating out of her throat - her mouth is so  _ dry  _ and she’s half tempted to change her clothes then and there because Annie just feels so  _ stifled.  _ But then the song is over and the singer is beckoning her closer with a devious little smile and Annie’s been caught, hook line and  _ sinker _ . 

“Now there's something special about you isn't there? Don't tell me. Let me guess…”

Annie stays quiet, a small, coy smile finding its place over her lips, pulling at an old scab from the last Deathclaw she fought.

“Hmm... I think I know a fellow performer when I see one. Good with your words? Know just the right thing to say at the right time?”

“Mmh, you could say that. Annie, Annie Simeone-Johannes. And you…?” Annie finishes it off with a small curtsy, well aware that the woman’s playing a game with her - it’s a fun one, though. Especially with a doll like the singer.

“Magnolia, just a pleasure to meet you. So, what brings a woman like you to my part of town, Miss Annie?”

“Oh, you know, I came here for the music.”

Magnolia chuckles, waving Annie off as she takes a seat at the bar - run by a Mr. Handy, Annie notices with a small bolt of surprise. She didn’t think any other than Codsworth had survived.

_ “Flatterer _ . I think you and I are going to get along. So, it's my turn to answer questions, right? What can I do for  _ you?” _

“I’m looking for a Miss Emogene Cabot - I heard the  _ lovely  _ singer at the Third Rail might know her,” Annie nearly purrs, and she can feel Deacon stiffen behind her (he’s only seen her barter and bully people, never employ the old movie charm that let her make it to the top, back when it mattered).

“Emogene? Sure, I know her. I haven't seen her in a while though. Are you a friend of hers?”

Annie’s  _ won  _ and they both know it, so there’s no more need to wheedle or cajole - no, she can be blunt and be honest now, and that suits her just fine. With a backwards look to Deacon, his eyebrows raised and the clench of his jaw translating to  _ something  _ she’ll need to ask him about later, she goes on to explain to the lovely, crooning, game-spinning Magnolia;

“She's missing and her family's worried about her - the Cabots hired me on, and her brother, Mr. Jack Cabot, is… well, he hasn’t seen her in a while, and you know how that would make one worry.”

“I'm glad somebody's looking out for her. She seems like a body that could use looking after.”

“She might be. I’ve heard she’s quite…  _ flighty.  _ Please, can you tell me what you know?”

Magnolia sighs through her nose, long, tired, as she snags a glass of water from the Mr. Handy (she calls him  _ ‘Charlie,’  _ so Annie files that away for later), “There was a preacher fellow who used to come here all the time. One of the slick ones... always going on about remaking your life and so on. You know the type.”

Annie barely bothers to hide her grimace, knowing exactly  _ ‘the type’  _ Magnolia means.

“Most of the customers wouldn't give him the time of day, but Emogene latched on to him for some reason - I don't suppose it hurt that he was easy on the eyes. Intense. Some women find that…  _ irresistible.” _

The pointed look she shoots Deacon is not lost on Annie, and she waves her hand, resulting in a short chuckle from Magnolia.

“Mhm… True, sadly, I can’t say I can understand that. Intense can mean… a lot of things.”

“Ha! Too true, too true, honey. Here, let me - Ham! Will you come over here a minute?”

_ Ham, of course.  _ The bouncer would  _ always  _ know about the riff-raff, it was his  _ job,  _ after all.

“Is there a problem, Miss Magnolia?”

“Oh, no. This sweet lady here was just looking for Emogene. Do you happen to know where that preacher fellow came from?”

“Brother Thomas?”

“Yes, that's right. The one Emogene was always hanging on.”

“Had to throw him out. Wouldn't stop bothering the customers with that ‘salvation’ racket… Here, I kept one of them. Just in case he didn't pay his bar tab.” Ham raises the burnt flesh where his eyebrow would be, holding out the flyer in his tight grip. His hands are gentle, though - placing it in Annie’s shaking hands and patting her knuckles with an almost familial smile.

“Thank you, Mr. Ham.”

“Thanks, honey. You were a big help.”

He’s halfway gone by the time the two women respond, calling over his shoulder with a tip of his hat. “Anything for you, miss.”

Annie takes a moment to inspect the handmade flyer, bottom lip caught between perfect teeth as she sucks in a huff of breath. “The ‘Pillars of the Community,’ huh?”

“I hope Emogene's all right. I didn't much like the idea of her going off with that preacher fellow.”

“Thanks a million, Magnolia. Shoot me a courier if you need anything, okay? I owe you.”

(Point to Deacon, now he’s got charm.)

\--

“So.”

“So?”

Annie turns to face Deacon, two steps away and just out of reach at any given point - she turns and raises her eyebrow at his nonchalant demeanor.

“So, you said you had something for me. It was one of the main reasons I  _ came  _ to Goodneighbor, Deacon. That and Emogene, but I don’t much like surprises, so that’s been taking point.”

Deacon takes a moment, taps his chin as if he’s acting out pulling something from deep in his memories, before making an exaggerated gasp of recognition and smirking all the while, “Oh! Yeah, my  _ surprise.  _ It’s, uh, it’s not ready yet? We got here quicker than I thought we would, so give it a week, okay?”

“Did we, now? Should I slow down for you, old man?”

“Ha! You wish you could keep up with me,  _ whippersnapper,”  _ Deacon’s smile is infectious and before she knows it she’s smiling too, bumping shoulders with him as they sit on a bench outside Daisy’s Discounts, feeding stray dogs the remainder of her dinner.


	6. roman holiday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annie feels like she's drowning, whether in grief or her heart, she can't tell.

Annie _still_ doesn’t like Deacon.

Sure, she enjoys his presence, enjoys his little quips as they go into battle and the fact he lets her steal his cigarettes. Enjoys the fact he doesn’t comment on her red eyes and tired demeanor after she spends a night listening to Ritchie’s holotape on loop.

Enjoys being around him, counting on the fact he won't stab her in the back and take the caps she’s been saving (1037 caps closer to her goal now) from her corpse.

Her mind, always there to make things a little harder, pipes up with a quick  _ ‘are you sure you really don’t like him?’  _ to which Annie barely suppresses a grumble - yes, she probably  _ does  _ like him, but isn’t it easier to dislike him? Easier to pretend that she thinks he’s just an annoyance?

(It makes it easier to pretend she still doesn’t see Ritchie every time she looks at him - but that’s fading, too quick, too fast.)

Annie still doesn’t like Deacon, but at least she can call him her  _ friend. _

But - and there’s always  _ something  _ with her, nowadays - when they're both undercover, investigating the 'Pillars of the Community' for the Cabots, she can let that pretense drop, and pretend to like him a bit more (it’s all a show, she likes him more than she could, or  _ would _ , ever admit.)

He's clad in navy blues and a tie that Annie couldn't help but fix (her mother always told her that her wandering hands would lead her to trouble, and if anyone said Deacon wasn’t trouble incarnate, then Annie said they needed glasses) with a cheeky grin and a quirked eyebrow (but it's not  _ Annie  _ who does it, she reminds herself. It's her persona, she's Audrey Hepburn and he’s Gregory Peck - and Audrey is starstruck and doe-eyed over her boyfriend.) So Audrey reaches up and grabs the lapels of Gregory's jacket and presses a soft kiss to his cheek, giggling and a puff of breath hits the shell of his ear, and Annie -  _ Audrey  _ \- can swear he goes red. Whether it's Deacon or Gregory though, the jury's still out. Deacon’s always been hard to read, hard to get a grip on.

But, of course, nothing Annie does is without a reason - a holdover from when one wrong look could send the paparazzo into a frenzy, whipping up rumors right and left. The ‘Good Times,’ as she would sarcastically refer to them as, much to Deacon’s chagrin. For a man who’d had to suffer through its after-effects, he sure had a rose-colored view of the whole deal.

(Point to Annie, she’s got his embarrassment now.)

_ "Brother Thomas is our only lead," _ her heartbeat is too fast, this is the most prolonged contact she's had with him - with anyone - since the Common and before the War, and she's all thumbs, all awkward Pre-War charm and grace, trying her best to stifle it down and acclimate to society,  _ "We should - talk to him." _

Gregory - no,  _ Deacon  _ \- runs his hand around to settle comfortably on her waist, and Annie’s heart lurches, acrid taste bubbling just behind her tongue. Her breath hitches and she feels like she's drowning, it's too much, too fast -

Deacon's hands are calloused from his sniper rifle, and rough from the tolls of the 'Wealth (Ritchie's were soft, too soft, he hated getting dirty. The draft ruined him, made his starlit charm fall away like some cheap party trick.) His other hand, soft, gentle, sits carefully on her shoulder, still, stopped, until he smooths a thumb over the crease of her rose-peach dress. Deacon acts like she’s glass, barely moving, until he finds the seam and rubs a soft circle into the meat of her shoulder. 

(Point to both of them, he’s got anxiety and she’s got care.)

_ “Thanks,”  _ she’s hidden from the rest of the camp, she realizes, Deacon using their cover of young lovers to pull her close to him, hide her face away in that soft space where neck meets shoulder - he smells like gun oil, smoke, and faintly of hubflowers, which Annie decides that she needs to investigate  _ why  _ she’s smelling her - her coworker, of sorts, but that can wait.

_ "What's the plan, Dreamboat?" _ She hates that she showed Deacon those old pre-war holos of songs; Dreamboat Annie had been her moniker from Ritchie, she didn't expect Deacon to hop on it too - serves her right, she supposed, because Deacon was  _ obsessed  _ with anything pre-war, from Michael Jackson to The Chordettes, and she was a walking, talking library of knowledge. Annie can at least appreciate him not asking if she's  _ okay _ . She gets enough of that from every ham-and-egger back in Sanctuary, and it tends to grate on the nerves after the fifteenth time within an hour.

_ "Wait for nightfall," _ she interrupts herself with a soft giggle, lazily tracing her hand over Gregory's -  _ Deacon's _ \- broad chest (Ritchie was wiry, thin and lithe, like a panther of sorts. Where Ritchie was all skin and hard muscle, Deacon is softness and broad bones, which Annie can appreciate.) Audrey - Annie -  _ whoever  _ she’s playing as - looks up adoringly at the trademark sunglasses that obscure his eyes, bats her eyelashes and ducks away with a playful grin upon noticing Brother Thomas (his leery demeanor makes Annie want to  _ spit _ ) watching the two of them, “C’mon, baby, you’re so  _ bad _ .”

“Only for you, sweetcheeks,” Deacon - no, now he’s Gregory, drawling and gentle, jokingly catches her arm, pulls her close and dips her - swing dancing to the sunset and Diamond City Radio, of  _ course  _ he’d try to pull something like that. 

No matter how hard-boiled Deacon acts, Annie knows he’s a romantic at heart.

“Oh, Gregory, you stop that, you big ol’ flirt,” Audrey laughs, loud and happy and then she’s pressed into his chest as Brother Thomas walks by, spouting some nonsense about ‘Enriching the Community.’

She can feel his heartbeat under her fingertips.

(It’s so  _ loud  _ and  _ fluttery,  _ like a frightened bird _ . _ )

Annie wonders if he can feel how nervous she is, how much trust and effort is going into their little con job. Wonders if she’ll ever have the courage to examine the most tender parts of herself, pick up the broken pieces and offer them to someone else, find solace in the arms of someone she trusts.

(And Deacon is still staring at her.)

Annie breaks away after a moment, her fingers trailing over his arm and noting every jump of his veins, every little scar she comes across - for a moment she can pretend again, pretend that everything’s fine and dandy and she’s not betraying the only man she ever loved by partnering up with his double.

She can pretend, because that’s what she’s good at.


	7. sweeter dreams of me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bad dreams linger, even 200 years later.

_ “You  _ left  _ me.” _

Ritchie’s voice is accusatory, hard and sharp as knives as he reaches out and grabs her wrists with an iron grip - Annie struggles, weeps and begs for him to  _ please get a hold of yourself, Ritchie, please, don’t do this!  _

He doesn’t listen.

She’s pinned to their king sized bed now, arms secured by a pair of handcuffs he stole off set (they’re filming a  _ noir detective movie,  _ of all things, and she’s the one who’s supposed to play the criminal. Not Ritchie - so why is he being so  _ beastly?) _

_ “You left me - you dirty, cheating whore!” _

_ “Ritchie, no - I -” _

_ “Shut up!” _

She should be prepared for this, prepared for the  sharp sting of his hand across her face. (She’ll bruise from that one, but her makeup team has covered up worse.)

_ “You’re nothing but a  _ tool.  _ A means to the end - a good lay, a pretty face, sure! But you’re  _ nothing  _ without me.” _

He snarls, spittle flying from his deranged mouth, and she winces, cringes back as he brings the knife up and presses it oh-so-very-gently at her hairline.

_ “What would you do if I ruined you? Destroyed that perfect, pretty face of yours?” _

She can’t speak - can’t  _ breathe  _ \- as he  pushes the knife down, down,  _ down,  _ sinking into supple flesh and muscle, deep enough that she screams, screams until her throat is raw and bloody, screams until he’s gone over her forehead, her eye, her cheek, her mouth -

Screams until she wakes up, fingers twisted in the covers of her ragged blanket, hair plastered to her sweaty forehead as her scar  _ burns  _ like it’s freshly made.

It’s nightfall already (she must’ve dozed off after dinner, the real question is how did she get in bed?), and the Pillars are no less sleazy after sundown. Brother Thomas stalks the aisles, watches outwards as the guards rotate who’s on duty, and yet Annie can’t quite get over the feeling she’s being  _ watched  _ (a  _ remnant,  _ her brain offers,  _ a remnant of your nightmare, you coward.) _

It’s unnerving, to say the least, and she’s already sweaty and half-crazed and just barely holding herself together, so that must explain why she’s carefully (frantically) moving her bedroll closer to Deacon’s.

That must explain why she’s reaching out for his hand, watching his face (he’s still wearing his sunglasses, she’s never seen him without them, and to anyone else, that might seem strange - but not to her) as she interlocks their fingers, counts the seconds as she sees his shoulders tense.

That must explain why he pulls her closer, close enough that he’s got his arm tucked around her, close enough that her head is on his shoulder and she’s being rocked by the rhythm of his breathing.

That must explain why he’s rubbing his thumb over her cheekbone, wiping away secret tears she didn’t even know she was shedding.

That must explain why he’s leaning in, pressing his lips to hers, soft and barely there but oh so real and oh so sweet, chapped and cracked and alive alive  _ alive. _

That must explain why her body sags as she falls asleep with their mouths together, comfortable in the safety of his arms.

\--

In the morning, Deacon acts like nothing happened, so Annie chalks it up to her overactive imagination and swears that the guilt she feels is because her nightmare was so unreal - so out of character for her lawfully wedded (dead) husband.

So they continue on, until they (more like Annie, Deacon is off doing  _ something)  _ manage to corner Brother Thomas while they till the fields.

“Brother Thomas, pardon me, may I speak to you for a moment?”

Her voice is plaintive, wheedling - all soft charm and innocence, enough to make Brother Thomas buckle and cave to her questions on the spot. 

Weaponizing herself was her forte, after all.

And Brother Thomas - Brother Thomas is all faux charm and snake-like smiles, a veritable pile of filth and rot compared to the things she held dearest, “Ah, Audrey, my dear - of course, of course!”

“Oh, oh thank you Brother Thomas.”

“What did you need, Audrey?”

Annie -  _ Audrey  _ \- smiles gently, bats her eyelashes and becomes the perfect picture of innocence within a moment, presses her hands together in a stance that’s best described as ‘pleading for mercy,’ “Please, Brother Thomas, I’ve been looking for my friend - I was told she came here, from Goodneighbor. I’m so  _ very  _ worried about her - her name is Emogene, Emogene Cabot - have you seen her?”

“Emogene Cabot -” Brother Thomas stutters, and Annie knows he’ll give her the information she needs, “Well, Miss Cabot had a, and I hesitate to say this, but a bit of a… breakdown, about a fortnight ago, and -”

“Oh, please, Brother Thomas, take me to her - she must be so dreadfully upset, hopefully I can help -”

“Oh, alright, fine.”

Annie holds back a triumphant laugh as Brother Thomas leads her behind the amphitheater, and she can just  _ barely  _ spot Deacon out of the corner of her eye as they end up in front of a small, secure booth.

“Is this…?”

“She is inside, yes.”

“Brother Thomas -”

“- I know, let me open it for you.”

Annie leaves a lingering touch on his shoulder before ducking inside, watching the door close like a coffin’s lid, like the way the doors sealed over her -

She shakes the thought away and turns to the only other person in the room, the woman who is  _ presumably  _ Emogene Cabot turns to her, raises an immaculate eyebrow and grimaces at her attire and Annie can’t help but roll her eyes.

“Emogene Cabot?”

“Yes, who’s asking?”

“Annie Simeone-Johannes. I thought you were… well, you look quite different from Jack, that is.” 

Emogene cocks an eyebrow and Annie wants to bite her tongue, she’s meant to flatter and  _ charm,  _ not antagonize Emogene into staying with the Pillars, “Sorry, I, ah -”

“You really know how to flatter a lady, don't you? Just to be clear - I'm Jack's  _ younger  _ sister. The  _ baby  _ of the family.”

“I apologize, I wasn’t thinking - it’s rude of me to presume anything… but you do look fantastic, Emogene.”

It’s a stalemate between them and Annie is half annoyed, half intrigued, because there’s  _ obviously  _ more to the Cabots than what meets the eye, but Emogene is petty and reminds her too much of a younger Annie.

“Well... thank you. Even though I know you're just being polite. You're different than the thugs Jack usually sends. I just need some serum and then you'll see why I was voted Miss Boston three years running… But you don't care about any of that, do you? I'm sure Jack sent you to fetch me home. He's  _ always  _ trying to control me.”

“Reminds me of someone I used to know - they always do think the pretty ones are meant to be controlled, don’t they?”

Emogene lets out a laugh to that, short and clipped and so similar to Annie at the beginning of her career, it’s giving her whiplash.

“They do, they really do… now, Miss Annie, what is your plan for getting us out of here?”

“Just play along, okay? I’m a wonderful actress, you know,” and before Emogene can protest, she’s linked their arms and striding confidently out of the little shed, and then  _ Deacon  _ is there, steady hand on Annie’s shoulder as he leads them away, thanking Brother Thomas before the three make their escape.


	8. old wounds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annie makes a leap of faith, Deacon's willing to hold out a rope.

Annie’s used to receiving her marching orders from PAM or Tinker Tom, picking up stray bits and pieces from Drummer Boy if need be - so when Desdemona corners her in HQ one day, she’s half afraid that she’s done something wrong.

“Mission for you - go to the highway, west of Lexington. Meet a tourist, let Deacon show you the ropes for dealing with live drops, got it?”

“Understood.”

A sigh of relief is long overdue one Desdemona stalks away, and Annie reviews her marching orders in her head - meet a _ ‘tourist,’ _ as Desdemona ( _ Dez _ , as everyone seems to call her) called them. Do a ‘live drop,’ information for _ something _that she’s not privy to the details of.

(At least not yet.)

Deacon always griped that Desdemona wasn’t using her to her full capability, her talents were that of the charming sense, and she could out-haggle even the most caps pinching of caravan traders - faintly, Annie wonders if the mission was his idea. He’s soon breaking her out of her silent musings as they slowly ascend the ruined highway, gently knocking into her with a cocky grin, “So, I'm looking for Railsigns. Symbols we use to send messages to each other.”

“Railsigns, okay,” Annie nods, squinting in the deep dark of the night, scarred up eye twinging as she strains it, “I like it, like Old World morse code, hm?”

“Yeah, kinda. If you like that, we got signs and countersigns, dead drops, and even a secret handshake.”

At her disbelieving silence, he laughs, holding up his hands in a universal gesture of surrender, “Alright, maybe the handshake never caught on.”

“You are a real _ hoot, _Mr. Deacon.”

“I try my best - anyway, the tourist should have a trail left for us.”

“Isn’t that counter-intuitive? I thought the point of the signs was to be stealthy, covert.”

“Yeah, that’s why they’re in code… here we go. Railsign.”

Deacon motions her closer, gestures to a crude symbol etched into the side of the derelict highway with a cheeky grin.

“Huh. I see that. I rescind my statement, then.”

Deacon laughs again, before waving her on, “C’mon, our tourist is up ahead. Let's keep going.”

Annie nods, doing her best to not roll her ankle on the debris as she keeps up with Deacon’s brisk pace. He’s quick - quicker than she thought he was, from his lazy demeanor.

“Got another Railsign. Right there… and another. We're probably close. D’you see the plus in the center? That means there's an ally nearby. Our tourist.”

“Alright - what should I do when we meet up with them?”

“You take point on the conversation. No matter what he says just say, _ ‘Mine is in the shop.’ _ Trust me.”

“Mine is in the shop - alright, I can do that.”

Annie _ would’ve _ done it straight from the point, if it wasn’t for the tourist - _ Ricky Dalton _\- shouting at her, spittle flying from his deranged mouth.

_ “Do you have a Geiger counter? Do-you-have-a-goddamn-Geiger-Counter?!” _ _  
_ He was all slurred paranoia and anxious stuttering, that was for sure. ( It reminds her of Ritchie when he’d get too drunk.)

“M… Mine is in the shop?”

Ricky sags, and Annie can relax, if only for a moment, before he jerks his head in Deacon’s direction, ready to bolt at any given moment, “Who the hell is _ he? _ HQ said they were only sending - sending _ one _ agent! Not two! So why the _ fuck _is there two of you?”

Deacon, smooth, unperturbed as ever, smiles apologetically and the next thing Annie knows, he’s gotten Ricky to calm down, “Sorry, I’m new - she’s just showing me the ropes.”

“Al-Alright. Jesus, the Wall is my witness, I thought I was _ dead. _It’s about goddamned time you headquarters bastards got here.”

Annie knows how to deal with people’s anxiety, knows how to play the game. She holds up her hands, makes a show of showing him that she won’t try anything, offering a sympathetic look to top it all off, “Hey, hey, tell me what’s going on.”

“I signed on for some - for some _ light _ recon. But that little _ Slocum’s Joe _ of yours is just _ crawling _ with goddamn chrome-domed sons-of-bitches. The front’s fortified to hell and back, they’ve placed _ mines _all over the goddamn place!”

Annie, understandably, blanches, taking two quick breaths to get her heartbeat back to normal.

“They have… a minefield?”

“Uh, _ yeah. _The mother of all minefields. I couldn’t draw you a map even if I tried!”

Another moment taken, Annie’s eyes flick to Deacon, who seems to either not care or care too much about what the tourist has to say, before she looks back to Ricky with a soft, warm smile.

“Thank you for all you’ve done - truly.”

“Well,” Ricky pauses, takes a breath and pinches the crease between his eyebrows, “I hope it helps. I really do.”

With that, their conversation is (obviously) over, and Annie steps back, far enough to where the jittery tourist can’t hear her, “Why did you lie to him?”

He deflects with a cocky grin and a shrug, pointing out to the ravens that roost up on the decrepit highways, “So, the Institute wasn't content with just creating synth people. Oh no, they have synth birds, too. You see those little raven bastards? They could be _ Watchers _. Reporting everything back to the mother ship… or wherever the Institute's hiding. So smile for the pretty birdies.”

“Birds? You sound like my old friend Louise. She was sure Reagan had replaced the birds with spies as well.”

“Louise had the right idea.”

A moment of silence between the two of them, comfortable, quiet, before Annie breaks it with a sigh and a shake of her head, “So, what was all that about Slocum’s Joe?”

“Oh, that? It was nothing.”

Too bad Deacon’s a goddamn _ liar _ and the next thing Annie knows she’s being led to the old Slocum’s Joe, his explanation of the most recent Railroad _ massacre _making his words tight and the death grip he’s got on her hand even tighter (neither of them are much for contact, but her eye was acting up and a raider had punched her hard enough for her good one to bruise an hour earlier, so it was either stumble around and alert every monster within 20 miles to their location, or hold hands at three in the morning.)

Annie softly protests, wincing as she stubs her toe on something warm (ish) and stumbles around, up until Deacon tugs her insistently forward, “Deacon -”

“Shh,” he presses a finger to his lips, barely able to be made out against the dark of the night, and Annie sulks for a moment, before continuing to pull against him, “Jesus, okay, okay, hold on - I know you’ve got no reason to trust me, I know that I’m asking for… for a _ lot _here, but please, just - what? What is it?”

“Which - which entrance?”

_ “What?” _

Annie takes a deep, steadying breath, before wiping at her angry eye with a tinge of annoyance, smiling up at the (obviously) surprised Deacon, “Which entrance? The back or the front? Front has mines, as dear Ricky said, and the back has Gen 1’s , remember? So which entrance are we using?”

“I - ah -”

“Didn’t expect me to agree? Please, I know this is important to you, to the rest of the Railroad - I wouldn’t say _ no _to… to helping you guys out.”

Deacon’s nearly _ glowing _at this point, it’s obvious in the way his fingers tremble and his mouth pulls up into a smile, “The back entrance is safer, but be ready for Gen 1s and 2s. With the, uh, way you are right now, there’s no way we’re getting through a fucking minefield, sorry to say it Charmer.”

“True. Just hold on a second - I’m no good in a fight like this,” Annie shrugs, digging in her pockets with her free hand, pulling out a Stimpack and flicking the needle with a wince, “You might want to look away. This won’t be pleasant.”

Deacon’s raised eyebrow is the last thing she sees before injecting it into her swollen flesh, letting out a hiss of pain and then a sigh of relief as the swelling fades to a point where she can at least point and shoot - and Deacon’s mild look of both fascination and horror is clear as daylight.

“What are you waiting for? Let’s go.”


	9. you suffocate me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trusting him is a game of Russian Roulette, with 5 bullets cocked in the chamber.

“Someone left a railsign here. This one means danger. Yeah, we know, you poor dead bastard, we know,” Annie crouches over the dead body, closes their eyes as Deacon looks away with a grim smile, “Rest in peace.”

“What was his name?”

Annie’s voice is small, gentle and oh-so-careful of Deacon and his obvious emotional turmoil - he’s grieving, they’ve all been grieving for so long, it’s evident through the way Desdemona waited so long to send her out on her first official tourist mission (four days might not seem too long to most people, but the Railroad is nothing if not quick) and the way Glory constantly challenges her to work harder.

“Greenie.”

“Rest easy, Greenie.”

She brushes her fingertips over his eyelids, shuts them carefully, and pretends not to notice Deacon clearing his throat and swiping at his eyes.

(Point to Annie; she’s got grief but she won’t dare acknowledge it.)

They take a moment in silence before they move on, picking off Gen 1’s every so often, up until Deacon stops her once more.

“Wait. See the box in the center of that Railsign -- that means there's a cache nearby - looks like Maven managed to hide something before... Well, you know. Look around.”

“Tinker managed to turn on the defenses. Barely slowed the Coursers down, but hey, it probably saved some lives - I don't think you've ever seen a Courser, but they're top-of-the-line in Institute ‘let's fuck up your day’ tech. There shouldn't be any Coursers in here, but if there are - just _ run.” _

A moment, a pause, before Deacon’s half… _ something _tirade continues.

“Don’t try and be a hero, okay?”

Annie pretends her voice doesn’t waver, that her hands don’t shake as her heart clenches at all the death around them.

“Okay.”

“Another active terminal. We didn't have time to trip the defenses up ahead. Power them up and we can give our friends a little _ surprise.” _

“A surprise? Deacon, you know I dislike surprises.”

“Trust me - those Gen 1's are in standard patrol mode. They don't know we're here… there's the command terminal over there. You hold tight,” Deacon gives her a sly grin and Annie can pretend once more that she’s just on set, filming yet another one of her world famous spy movies, as his fingers glide across the terminal’s keyboard with ease, “I'm going to have some fun.”

It only takes a moment of staccato gunfire before it goes silent again, save for Annie and Deacon’s breathing - that and the sound of dying circuits. Deacon has a smile a mile long and full of glee, and Annie feels shell-shocked, breathless, but most of all? She’s having fun.

“Bye, bye, Gen 1’s,” she whispers as they pick over their dying remains, pocketing loose ammo without a second thought. It only takes a moment before they’re in the main hallway, and Deacon is piping up with another tidbit for her to store away;

“Prepare to be shocked: not every Slocum's Joe has a massive tunnel complex underneath it.”

“Yes, I was wondering - what is this, some sort of… government sanctioned headquarters from before the war?”

“Probably, the DIA had their fingers in all sorts of pies.”

“I see,” Annie’s voice catches on the last word as they enter the antechamber, eyes wide as she takes it all in.

It’s infinitely better defended than the Old North Church, definitely a lot more room too.

There’s also a lot more bodies on the ground.

“So it's time you learn why we're here. We're retrieving a… _ prototype _developed by our good Doctor Carrington.”

“Wait, wait, before we go on - tell me about the Gen 1’s and 2’s.”

“What, you didn’t learn enough already?”

“Not enough to, ah, _ understand _, per se.”

“Well, the synths didn't start off as nigh perfect copies of human beings. No, the Institute had to work up to that level of hubris - Gen 1’s and 2’s were stepping stones along the way. The Railroad's not fully united on how we feel about them.”

Annie cocks her head, hand on the doorway of the safe room, almost afraid to go inside, see what horrors are next on their journey, “Not fully united? How so?”

“Everyone wants to liberate the Gen 3’s. The human looking synths. Some of the synths in the Railroad, like Glory, think we should help earlier models, too. But Gen 1's are basically the same as, well, a Protectron. So the line gets muddy. Do we defend AI rights? Terminals? Hell, _ turrets? _ Any time it gets brought up: fireworks. All the old arguments flare up. The upshot is Glory and some others won't run missions like this.”

“I see - we’ll, do you want to…”

“Snag the prototype? Ladies first.”

“You’re too kind,” Annie’s teasing, falling into an easy rhythm with him as she shoots a half gone Gen 1 through the head, brushing the dust off her pants with her other hand.

“Hey, a guy has to have his moments… but I'll be straight with you, although you're not going to like it.”

“And what am I not going to like, Mr. Deacon?”

“Well, I have no idea what the prototype does.”

Annie nods, thinking for a moment, before she motions for him to continue, “I’m sensing there’s more?”

“Us Railroad agents are treated like mushrooms: kept in the dark and fed... well, you get the idea. It's got to be important, though, Dez wouldn't risk our hides lightly.”

“Risk _ your _hide, you mean. This is my first tourist mission, and you know -”

“Know what?”

“Know I’m just _ Charmer - _you can get someone who’s good at sweet-talking information out of clients for a dime nowadays.”

“Yeah, maybe. But no one’s quite like you.”

Annie flushes red and Deacon takes initiative, flitting into the next room like a ghost, “Well, the terminal's on at least. I'm going to feed it some passwords.”

“I’ve got your six.”

“My what?”

“Your - Old World colloquialism, I’ll watch your back, it means.”

“Huh. I’ll remember that.”

“No doubt you will,” Annie chuckles, scoping the room out and checking door locks with practiced ease, perking up when she hears Deacon’s muttered groans of frustration.

“No, no... no…”

She comes closer, peeks over his shoulder at the tangle of words on the screen, unable to make heads nor tails of it, the jerking of his head as he clicks something making her startle.

“Carrington. Stanley. _ Salus aegroti suprema lex _ \- open says me!”

“Latin, huh. Even in death it persists - _ oderint dum metuant,” _Annie murmurs as Deacon pumps his fist in delight, starting in surprise as she claps his shoulder goodnaturedly.

The door opens with a pneumatic hiss, and Annie averts her eyes upon noticing the body that lies on the floor. Too much death - too much carnage lies in the ruins of the Switchboard.

(It’s cold in here, too much like the icebox from which she woke.)

“So Tommy Whispers didn't make it out - he died protecting our secrets.”

“It looks like -”

“I know. Poor bastard probably…”

“Are you okay?”

“Just - Grab Carrington’s prototype, okay?”

Annie nods, solemn, and closes Tommy’s eyes with a sort of angelic reverence. She doesn’t know these people, doesn’t understand - but she’s still human and she _ aches _for the Railroad’s loss. She moves forward, past Tommy, grabs the most high-tech thing she can see and pockets it in her bag with a sigh turned gasp as she feels a hand on her shoulder.

She whips around, gets ready to throw a punch, before Deacon puts his hands up, a gun in one and a bashful smile prevalent, “Hey, cool it Charmer. ‘S just me - I got you a gift though.”

“A… gift?”

“Here. Tommy would want you to have his hand-cannon. Don't let its size fool you - you'll never find another weapon like it.”

If Annie was a different person, if it was a different time, she’d crack a joke. Instead - she takes it, solemn, presses a kiss to the barrel and tucks it into her waistband with a firm nod.

“Thank you.”

“May it serve you as well, heck, better than it did Tommy.”

Another nod between the two of them and Annie is most definitely _ not _tearing up, no, she’s just turning away to take a deep breath as she stares down the long corridor that leads to the front entrance.

To the _ minefield. _

(She still doesn’t know if she can make it through, her eye’s swelling back up and she needs the vials she left with Codsworth to fix her eye up again.)

“There's an elevator at the end of the hall. It should be a hell of a lot easier fighting the chrome-domes on this side of the minefield - are you up to it?”

It’s like he can read her like a goddamn _ book. _Her eyes flick to the left as she pats her pockets, searching for another Stimpack.

“I need to, ah, do… that again. Just - give me a second, okay? I just have to find a, um, oh where is it -”

Annie’s ready to snarl when she can’t find another, ready to scream in frustration and tiredness. She just needs one, _ one!, _Stimpack until she gets back to Sanctuary - serves her right for not bringing her antibiotics with her when she left.

Serves her right for thinking she could still _ function _when half of her sight is FUBAR.

“Do you -”

Deacon’s voice catches her off guard, and she looks up, startled.

“- want me to…?”

“Do you have one?”

“Yes - yeah. Always do,” Deacon’s _ obviously _ uncomfortable, they’re coworkers at _ best _and whatever slapstick routine they’ve been dancing around for the past few weeks is just a result of sleep deprivation and eating too many iguana bits, “How do you want me to go about this, Charmer?”

Annie takes a deep breath, lets herself settle and relax and think about what they’re about to do _ clinically, _“Well, as is obvious, my eye is… swollen. From a punch. So what you’re about to do is get me right here, below my eye. And yes, before you ask, you have to do it there, because otherwise it’ll just go and heal my, uhm… nevermind. Just - right, okay. Just - here, give me your hand.”

Deacon hesitates, and Annie snags his hand with a shaky smile, pressing his fingertips to the point just above her cheekbone - it’s intimate, what they’re doing. Intimate in a way she can’t describe, because his hand is cupping her face and his thumb is smoothing over the high point of her cheeks and he’s about to basically _ stab _ her because God _ forbid _she see a doctor anymore.

“Are you sure?”

She’s shaking like a leaf and she knows that _ he _knows that she’s terrified of relying on someone else for a change.

_ “No,” _the word is a puff of air between them, and she winces at the moment of weakness, “I-I mean -”

“What do you want me to do?”

“I don’t know.”

“Do you trust me?”

“Maybe.”

“Good answer.”

With a chuckle and a nervous bite of his lip, he carefully injects her, and the only thing she can focus on is how steady his hands are but how shaky his breathing is.


	10. mistaken identity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Swans are the devil's spawn, Annie comes to find out.

“Hey, wake up,” Ritchie shakes her shoulder gently, trying to raise Annie from the land of sleep with a chuckle and the tantalizing smell of an omelet, “C’mon, sweet-talker, we gotta get a move on.”

She grumbles, pushing his hands away with a sleep-blurred groan, then interlacing their fingers with a sigh and a small grin, “‘S too early to be awake.”

“It’s almost noon,” he points out, and Annie lets out  _ another  _ grumble, pulling him close, closer, until he’s nearly on top of her and she’s pressing her lips to the corner of his mouth, missing her mark due to her bleary, tired eyes - she blinks, covers her eyes with a groan upon the sun breaking through the clouds, rolls over once more and pulls up the blanket.

"Five more minutes, handsome - let me get my beauty sleep.”

“I’m glad you think I’m  _ handsome _ , Charmer.”

Whatever sleep-induced  _ vision  _ she was having comes to an abrupt halt, and her ears go red and her cheeks go white as her body fights to decide on the emotion she’s having - because it’s not Ritchie, waking her up with a surprise breakfast, it’s Deacon, making a mirelurk omelet with a red face.

(Point to them both, now a new emotion is cataloged.)

_ “Fuck _ \- sorry, sorry,” Annie groans, pressing a hand to her forehead, embarrassed and annoyed at her brain, “That is… awkward of me. Sorry.”

“No harm, no foul.”

“You sure?” 

“Yeah, no biggie. I mean, I can’t blame you, I  _ am  _ handsome,” Deacon waggles his eyebrows and smirks, to which Annie responds by punching him lightly in the arm, “Hey, I did wake you up for a reason, though - other than the omelet.”

“What reason, Deacon?”

“Your surprise is ready.”

\--

Annie’s surprise starts off with them traveling to Goodneighbor, and Deacon’s tracking every movement as he picks across the Commons - he’d warned her not to go in there, but of  _ course  _ she was stubborn and bullheaded and sarcastic, joking as she inched nearer and nearer to the pond.

“Charmer, we’re  _ really  _ in for it now -”

She cuts him off with a grumble, flicking droplets of ancient water from her fingertips, “I know, I know… but I thought you meant because of, oh, I don’t know, the  _ raiders,  _ not a fucking  _ behemoth,  _ Deacon! I’ve never fought one of those before!”

He has to bite back a laugh at her panic, by her own admission she’s never fought one, which means they’re well and  _ fucked,  _ but who isn’t anymore? At least he’s got his gun and the faith that she won’t shoot him in the back over something petty.

“Deacon - Deacon what do we  _ do.” _

“What, no great plan in that head of yours, boss?”

Charmer  _ snarls  _ and it’s downright  _ endearing,  _ which Deacon finds a little strange but - as long as he keeps his thoughts, his  _ feelings,  _ locked up deep inside nothing should ever come of it and then the both of them can pretend the past couple of weeks…  _ weirdness  _ never happened.

Or something.

Annie -  _ Charmer,  _ he reminds himself - flinches as the behemoth (Swan is what it called itself when it rose from the lake, like some demented version of King Arthur’s Lady of the Lake) lumbers around the Commons, searching for something it can eat.

She’s shaking, he realizes with a pang in his gut, she’s shaking and she’s  _ afraid. _

(Deacon doesn’t think he’s ever seen her afraid.)

“Deacon.”

“Charmer.”

“Tell me what we should do.”

And  _ God,  _ isn’t that the question of the hour, but as he turns to retort sarcastically Deacon finds the words die on his lips at her expression - because it’s so open, so honest, so everything-Deacon-isn’t, and it nearly makes him scream because  _ what the fuck has he done to deserve this much trust. _

“I think,” He has to pause to clear his throat, mind tossing and turning as he hopes he can come up with a plan, “I think our best bet is to book it across here, duck behind the junk fence over there, and loop around the buildings. A bit of a detour, but we’ll still be alive by the end of it, and…”

“And that’s all that matters.”

She nods and something inside Deacon’s chest squeezes  _ tight  _ and then on the count of three they’re running for their lives, the behemoth behind them roaring in a blind rage, and then they’re ducking behind a fence and into an old store as the monster (because that’s what it is, a monster) tries to follow.

A moment of silence as it stops smashing it’s heavily mutated body into the building, giving up in search of easier prey, and then Deacon looks at Charmer with an expression that is best described as ‘holy shit, I cannot believe that actually worked’ - and then Annie’s  _ laughing,  _ hand pressed to her forehead as she cackles in a way that’s so  _ genuine,  _ so quintessentially  _ her  _ that it makes him laugh too, hysterical and exuberant and they fall into each other and shout in alarm as a rogue feral pops up, then pops off as Annie makes the shot.

She draws back into him with something best described as a guffaw, spinning around and latching onto his arm as they duck and weave through the half-rotten walls, picking off the ferals that pop up now and again with a sort of carefree ease, and Deacon can’t find it within himself to give this up, to spin some fabricated tale or do  _ something  _ that’ll pull the two apart.

(Not yet, at least.)


	11. great minds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A storm brews on the horizon, but Annie's too preoccupied with the smell of ozone.

Annie’s all too glad when they get to Goodneighbor, even happier still when she sees that Finn’s body has been cleared away, the old taint of metallic memories no longer fresh on her tongue. 

(She’s even happier still when Deacon ties a piece of semi-clean cloth around her eyes, a makeshift blindfold, and leads her through the streets, promising her surprise is  _ just around this corner - hey, keep those peepers shut tight, you trust me, right? _ )

He’s got a firm grip on her shoulder and her waist and he won’t lead her astray, won’t trip her up and leave her in the dust, so she relaxes - a deep breath spills out of her lungs and all the tension she didn’t know she was holding rolls off of her shoulders like water on a windshield - and then he’s stopping her and she can see faint red light through the spotty cloth.

“Alright, alright, here we are - tada!”

With a laugh, he removes the blindfold and Annie’s face to face with a place called ‘The Memory Den’, and she can’t quite understand the significance until Deacon clears his throat, embarrassed, and rubs at the wig he’s currently wearing.

“So, I know it’s supposed to be this ‘big secret,’ but I - I heard that you’re looking for your kid. And I know you’re working with ol’ Nicky, but - well, if anyone’s able to wrench free secrets from a dead guy, it’s Doctor Amari - and I know this is… sorta unconventional, of sorts, and not like a, uh, like an  _ actual gift  _ sorta thing, but I just thought -”

Annie’s cutting him off mid-sentence, scrambling forward and crushing him in the tightest hug she can give, shoulders shaking as she realizes how  _ close  _ she is to getting everything she loves  _ back,  _ safe and sound in her arms.

So when she speaks, there’s a tremble in her voice, the bullshit confidence stripped away into brutal honesty and stardrop tears in the corners of her eyes, “Deacon, I -  _ thank you.” _

The words are so  _ raw,  _ so  _ real  _ and  _ true,  _ that for a moment she thinks she’s scared him off with how grateful she seems but that’s not the case as he goes red (or is it the lighting?) and pulls her back in for the most prolonged contact they’ve had since the Cabot escapades.

“Hey, it’s no problem at all, sweetcheeks - I had to do  _ something  _ to keep you around, after all.”

It’s all teasing and flushed cheeks and for a moment nothing exists but the two of them, and then Annie’s breaking from him with a soft smile and a bounce in her step as she hurries inside, the hope of seeing her son again making her move faster than she’d ever gone before.

\--

“Wait. I  _ know  _ you. You're in the Railroad. What's this all about?”

Annie thinks for a moment that Dr. Amari knows her, which is impossible, since they’ve never met before - but then she realizes the doctor’s eyes are locked on Deacon, and it all makes a little more sense.

Deacon’s taking point before she can even get her bearings, a hand on Annie’s elbow and that usual  _ damnable  _ smirk, “We need your help, doc. I -  _ we _ need the memories from a man named Kellogg.”

“I am sensing a  _ ‘but’  _ here, Mister Deacon,” Amari is quick, lightning-fast and  _ harsh -  _ but Annie can appreciate that, since she’s so fucking  _ close  _ to seeing her son again, so close and yet so far.

“Buuuuut… he’s kinda, sorta, one hundred and ten percent  _ dead.” _

“Are - Are you two mad?! Putting aside the fact that you're asking me to defile a corpse, you do realize that the memory simulators require intact,  _ living  _ brains to function?”

So close and yet so fucking  _ unbelievably  _ far.

“This dead brain had inside knowledge of the  _ Institute _ , doc. The biggest scientific secret of the Commonwealth. You need this, and so do we - c’mon, call it a favor between friends.”

Doctor Amari, reasonably disturbed by their request, sighs and chews her knuckle, annoyed - exasperated, maybe. Annie’s too far gone to tell, too emotional, too raw, like an open wound.

“Fine. I'll take a look, but no guarantees. Do you... have it with you?”

Now she pipes up, digging in her pack for the little bits of brain matter that Dogmeat had refused to let her leave behind - disgusting, yes. But they were the key, she knew that now, and by  _ God  _ was Annie going to find her son, or die trying, “How much do you need to complete the procedure?”

“That is not an encouraging question. I suppose I'll have to make do with... whatever you can find.”

“Here’s, ah, well, this is all I could… recover, per se.”

A beat passes, and Doctor Amari’s expression  _ twists,  _ contorted with untold emotions, “What's this? This isn't a brain! This is...wait…”

Annie’s got a death grip on Deacon’s arm, and she barely registers his wince of mild pain - they’re so  _ close,  _ so close she can just  _ imagine  _ holding her baby boy back in her arms -

“That's the hippocampus! And this thing attached to it. A neural interface?”

“Will it  _ work,  _ Amari,” Deacon squeezes her elbow again, a jolt of warmth Annie didn’t know she needed (he sounds so  _ confident,  _ how can he sound like that when they’re discussing her son’s life over the brain of her husband’s murderer?)

“There's no sign of decay, so the tech is probably preserving the tissue - injecting  _ some  _ kind of compound to keep it stable. But there's no way to access the memories inside without a compatible port -”

The thought strikes Annie like lightning, and she turns to Deacon with wide eyes, a whisper between them as she hears the familiar sound of grinding gears in the background, “You didn’t.”

“I  _ did, _ ” Deacon’s shit-eating grin only widens as Annie pulls away, locks eyes with the only older generation synth she’s ever trusted, and the first person in the Commonwealth who didn’t use her for their own gain -

_ “Nick!” _


	12. green eyed demon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Whether she's the lock, or she's the key, Annie will find a way.

Deacon isn’t jealous when Annie leaps from him to draw Nick Valentine up into the biggest hug he’s ever seen her give. He’s not jealous when she laughs in pure delight and presses a kiss to the old robot’s creased cheek. 

He’s  _ definitely  _ not jealous when she takes his hands in his (she either doesn’t notice or just doesn’t  _ care  _ about his metal one, all sharp claws and danger) and gives him a smile he’s only seen when she thinks he isn’t looking.

“Nick! What are you doing here? I thought - I thought you were back in Diamond City, with Ellie!”

“Eh, word around was you were finally getting another lead on your son, doll, and this detective wanted to see you through, lend a hand,” Nick is all soft charm and Old World ideals, he and Annie are so alike and yet so  _ viscerally  _ different - he’s like her father, he thinks with a quiet laugh.

Nick slings an arm over Annie’s shoulders, ruffling her hair and squeezing her tight as she looks to Deacon with starry eyes - she’s  _ grateful,  _ he realizes. She’s grateful and Deacon is -

Deacon is -  _ something.  _ He’s… confused, but with heart palpitations. 

_ God,  _ he feels like a teenager again  _ (when did she start making him second guess his every word?) _

She’s playful, poking him in the ribs with a cheeky grin, Deacon-esque in the moment and his heart skips a beat, “And how are  _ you  _ going to lend a hand, hm?”

“You need a port to plug into, I’m your man - er, synth… an  _ old  _ synth. If the Institute built me out of similar parts, we might have an in.”

“Mister Valentine is an older generation synth. But, Institute technology being what it is... The brain implant  _ could  _ fit him. There... could be long-term side effects. I don't know where to even begin with listing the risks…”

He can  _ see  _ Annie tense up, her eyes darting from Amari to Nick and then back to him, awareness dawning on her features like sunrise in Boston, “Nick - Nick please, are you  _ sure - _ ”

Deacon steps closer, intruding in the bubble the two float in, places his hand on her shoulder and squeezes (when did he get so comfortable with contact?)

“Hey, don’t worry about me kid, I’m tough. Remember when you crashed Skinny Malone’s party?”

“I remember you being the damsel in distress.”

“Ha! You got me there - but we survived that, survived Kellogg. Stickin’ that  _ bastard’s  _ brain into me won’t be what does me in, okay?”

“Okay.”

Deacon feels like he’s intruding, like this is all some private event and Amari and him are watching something not meant for their eyes - but he can’t find it in him to pull away.

“Plug me in Amari - let’s do it.”

Nick and Annie pull apart, and Deacon steps back, a guardian angel in the moment as Nick sits down in the lounger, rolls his shoulders and Annie looks like her heart is breaking, “If I start cackling like an old, grizzled mercenary, pull me out, okay?”

Amari shrugs off the joke and Deacon can’t hold back the short chuckle, earning himself a good-natured grin from Nick - he feels Annie move closer, take his hand in hers and use him as a lifeline.

“Let's see here… I need you to keep talking to me, Mister Valentine. Any slight change in your cognitive functions could be dire.”

“There's a lot of... flashes... static... I can't make sense of any of it, doc.”

“Damn it - That's what I was afraid of. The mnemonic impressions are encoded.”

“What do you mean by ‘encoded,’ doctor?”

Annie’s nothing if not curious, that’s for damn sure - maybe it’s a defense mechanism, to keep her sane as she watches her friend get his brain rearranged.

“It appears the Institute has one last failsafe. There's a lock on the memories in the implant -”

“Is Nick okay?”

“Yes, the connections appear to be stable. Hopefully, it'll be as simple as unplugging the implant once we're done. But that doesn't get around the current problem.”

“How do you even - how do you  _ lock  _ memories?”

“The implant is encoding all the mnemonic activity in the hippocampus. Think of it like... computer encryption. And we don't have the password.”

“So how do we  _ get  _ the password?”

“The memory encryption is too strong for a single mind, but... what if we used two? We load both you and Mister Valentine into the memory loungers. Run your cognitive functions in parallel. He'll act as a host while your consciousness drives through whatever memories we can find.”

Deacon’s blood runs cold as he parses out what Amari’s asking Annie - and it’s essentially suicide, like a synth memory wipe but  _ much  _ more dangerous. Distantly, he realizes he’s worried about someone other than himself, for once, and the feeling is so foreign and alien that he can’t even protest as Annie agrees.

“All right. Let's get started.”

“Annie -”

“Deacon, I  _ have  _ to. Nick is - he’s risking a lot for me, there’s… there’s so much on the line here, I just -”

“Be careful, okay?”

“Okay - Doctor Amari! Any idea what I’m going to see in there?”

“I have no clue, but considering we only have a single piece of the medial temporal lobe, and not the whole brain, I doubt it'll be... cohesive.”

“Got it.”

“Just sit down over there. And... keep your fingers crossed.”


	13. in sync

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this most recent chapter goes out with a lot of love to the people who've been leaving kudos - and @assvictoriam!!!!!!!!!!! thank you SO much for your kind words, i actually teared up a bit reading your comments ;; :' )

She’s  _ terrified,  _ the feel of the glass door closing over her head, the plush interior - it’s too similar to the icebox, to the graveyard she crawled out of (at least she’s not alone this time, she has Deacon now, who hovers over the pod with a grimace, worry creasing deep lines into his face.)

“Initiating brain-wave migration between the transplant and the host… wait - yes! Mnemonic activity coming from the transplant! It's degenerated, but it's there! We're going to load you into the strongest memories we can find. They might not be... stable... Just hold on!”

The screen lights up and Annie’s left plunging into the darkness, Deacon’s face etched into the backs of her eyelids.

“Can you hear me? Ah, good. The simulation appears to be working, although the memories are quite fragmentary.”

It’s dark at first, and for a moment Annie wonders if she’s gone blind - but then blue and green splotches glow, luminescent and cloying, and she can hardly even respond, “I - it’s just a pathway, Doctor Amari. I’m going to follow it.”

“And I will try to step you through the intact memories - I just hope we find one that gives us some clue to the Institute's location.”

Annie resists the urge to respond with her usual biting sarcasm or some quip (something that’d usually bring a smile to Deacon’s face), instead pushing forward until -

_ “...and that makes it official, folks. The final vote count from the Hub is in: 55% in favor of joining the New California Republic…” _

The first memory hits her like a sucker-punch, all quiet mournfulness and the soft light of a gas lamp; there’s a child sitting on the bed, his mother reading beside him on an armchair that Annie used to admire in catalogs -

Kellogg’s voice whispers in the back of her mind and it’s only Doctor Amari’s clinical tone that keeps her from breaking down, “I apologize in advance, but you’re going to be experiencing these memories as  _ Kellogg,  _ so they may be… disorienting at first.”

_ “...all five states have now signed on, which means that as of this moment, we are all citizens of the New California Republic…” _

Annie reaches for the woman, almost on instinct, and Kellogg’s voice surprises her with its softness, its reverence, “Mom knew how it was. She wasn’t soft, but she loved me in her way… and she protected me from Dad.  _ That  _ cost her more than a few beatings.”

How can a man as cruel as Kellogg sound so - so  _ tender.,  _ how can a cold-blooded killer be so honest?

“I never knew what happened to her after I left. I didn’t  _ want  _ to know. Not then.”

Annie blinks back tears and inhales sharply, looks around the room for the exit until her eyes fall on the young Kellogg - again, she moves forward, looks over his comics with a forlorn smile as she realizes she bought the same kind for Shaun all those years ago.

“I was such a  _ dummy  _ back then - what did  _ I  _ know about how the world worked?”

The pain is evident and Annie realizes, with a twist in her gut, that she can  _ sympathize  _ with the man who ruined her life.

“I think now she wanted me to kill him - I  _ should  _ have killed him. Instead I… I ended up running away - I told myself I wanted to find somewhere out from under the thumb of the NCR and all their rules, but really I was running from the guilt of not protecting her from Dad.”

The exit is  _ right there  _ but Annie’s rooted in place and the sound of Kellogg’s voice makes her want to  _ vomit. _

“Doesn’t matter now, though.”

It’s over, suddenly, and all she’s only left with the radio quietly behind her as she runs to the next memory, as fast as she can.


	14. like looking in a mirror

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annie's too much like her demons.

Annie  _ hates  _ the in-between moments, when she’s walking a tightrope from memory to memory. When the only reminder she’s still alive is Amari’s voice, filtering in like a dream - like she’s underwater.

Then she comes to her senses, and sees a baby in a crib and Kellogg standing next to it, a woman to the side and exhaustion etched into their features.

(She’d take the in-between moments over  _ this. _ )

Kellogg had a  _ daughter _ .

Kellogg was a  _ father. _

It’s so - so jarring, so alien and uncomfortable, for Annie to connect her own broken home to Kellogg’s. To see the way he brushes his hand on his wife’s - he had a  _ wife  _ \- shoulder, laughs as the baby makes a noise -

Annie's crying, and she doesn't quite know  _ why _ . It might be the fact she can see herself, see the reflection of who she used to be in him, see the killer she's become in him, see the anger in his eyes and the pain that's locked up tight. It might be because he's not supposed to be  _ human, _ he's supposed to be a  _ monster, _ be the thing that ruined her life, ruined  _ everything _ -

Annie doesn't know  _ why _ she's crying.

She presses her lips together and inhales, hopes to smooth over the broken glass in her stomach and the acrid burn of her tongue. Hopes that whatever happens in here doesn’t reflect the outside. 

(Hope Deacon can’t see her sobbing through the glass.)

“The thing about happiness is… you only really know you had it once it’s  _ gone. _ ”

“Shut up.”

Her voice is low as she stares the ghost of Kellogg down, furiously rubbing her eyes and grimacing when her scar twinges in discomfort - she knows he won’t respond,  _ can’t  _ respond, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be cathartic.

“I mean, you may think to yourself that you’re  _ happy,  _ but… you don’t really  _ believe it. _ ”

“Shut. Up.”

“You focus on the petty bullshit, or the next job, or  _ whatever. _ ”

“Shut  _ up  _ you son-of-a-bitch, shut the  _ fuck  _ up - what do  _ you  _ know about being happy, you  _ fucker. _ ”

“It’s only when you’re looking back, with a comparison with what comes after, well - that’s when you  _ really  _ understand what happiness felt like.”

“Shut the fuck  _ up  _ you  _ goddamn  _ monster - you don’t  _ get  _ to talk about being  _ happy,  _ you don’t  _ get  _ to lecture me you - you fucking  _ ghost! _ ”

He falls silent and Annie’s chest is  _ heaving  _ and she didn’t realize her nails had drawn blood until she feels the slow burn of punctured skin - she turns away from Kellogg with a groan, pushes her hair out of her eyes and hisses as it catches in the divots she’s left in her palms - his voice starts once more, as her eyes fix on the woman ( _ Sarah _ , his mind supplements) and it takes all of her willpower not to scream right then and there.

“I was the worst thing that ever happened to her.”

“You were the worst thing that ever happened to  _ me,  _ you - you sick  _ fuck. _ ”

She’s talking to  _ ghosts  _ and deep down she  _ knows  _ they won’t respond, but Annie needs to do  _ something  _ before she flies off the handle into batshit crazy territory - maybe she already landed there, who knows.

“If… If she’d never met me -”

“- If I’d  _ never  _ met you -”

She draws a breath, trembling,  _ angry,  _ stares into the woman’s -  _ Sarah’s  _ \- eyes and feels an odd sort of kindred emotion with the dead woman, laments the sorrows they’d both endured at the hands of Sarah’s  _ husband. _

“- she’d have stayed in the  _ Hub  _ -”

“- I’d have stayed in the  _ Vault  _ -”

The Vault - that  _ fucking  _ freezerbox that was more like a grave than anything. Dozens of her neighbors, of her  _ friends,  _ dead, frozen - unable to be buried because of  _ fucking  _ Kellogg.

“- maybe hooked up with someone who didn’t -”

“- maybe been woken up by someone other than -”

Murderer, bastard, mother-fucker-who-ruined-her- _ life.  _ If she could kill him again, she’d make it slower. Draw it out longer and make him  _ suffer. _

“- kill for a living.”

“- the one who killed us.”

Annie  _ screams,  _ pure agony and anger, fists her hands in her hair and sobs, a full body sort of shiver and shake - then she falls to her knees and lies at Sarah’s feet, the smiling goddess who orchestrated her own  _ death. _

God, does she envy Sarah, dead and buried - gone for good, with no Minutemen or Railroad begging her for help.

“Probably would’ve been happier. Almost  _ certainly  _ lived longer.”

Annie wishes Kellogg had died with the rest of his fucked up family, that or he’d popped the .44 in-between her eyes, like he’d seemed so keen on doing at first.

She’s moving on, again, like a ghost - and then she’s sprinting, faster, as she leaves Kellogg behind in a hallway, the voice of an angel (the voice of a demon) ringing through the old concrete walls, taunting them both with a saccharine smile.


	15. fugue state

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annie re-discovers her hate.

When she steps into the pod, Deacon starts pacing, because she’s already shaking three minutes in.

When Amari talks to her, Deacon watches quietly, whiteknuckled and in agony.

And when Annie -  _ Charmer -  _ starts crying, he’s grabbing Amari by the lapels of her knockoff lab coat, all teeth and barely restrained anger.

“What the  _ fuck  _ is going on in that pod - Amari, what the fuck is happening to her?”

“I - a memory. It’s hard to keep her memories separate from Kellogg’s, but this one is shared and I can’t get her out unless I’m at the console so would you  _ please  _ unhand me, Mr. Deacon.”

(When Amari calls him  _ ‘Mr. Deacon,’  _ it feels all wrong. Foreign. Like the ghost of someone you’ve forgotten already. Her teeth catch in all the wrong places and with a start, he realizes it’s because of Sleeping Beauty - freezer burnt love. Something like that - he pushes it away with a shake of his head.)

Charmer is  _ still  _ sobbing, quiet, unmoving, but big fat tears fall down her cheeks as she shivers, afraid, terrified,  _ something,  _ and it takes every ounce of willpower in him not to break the glass and get her  _ out. _

Deacon’s fingers  _ itch  _ and he wants to go outside, wants to smoke or do  _ something  _ to calm down - but then Charmer starts  _ screaming  _ and his heart clenches, tighter, tighter still, and for the first time, at the ripe old age of who-fucking-knows, Deacon thinks he’s having a  _ heart attack. _

And then she stops.

And then he waits.

And then Amari lines up the next memory in the sequence.

\--

“We're running out of brain here... uh...  _ ah _ , there's one that looks mostly intact. Connecting now.”

The next memory loads and, at first, Annie doesn’t realize what’s happening.

And it’s dark, and the sirens haven’t started up yet - and then she sees the cleanroom suits, the flash of Kellogg’s strange outfit -

She’s frantic, her throat is raw and she’s pleading,  _ begging  _ Amari to  _ please just get me the fuck  _ out  _ of here - why would you make me see  _ this  _ \- please don’t make me  _ watch  _ this again - _

“Again? Oh - oh my god, not again. I'll try to locate another memory as quickly as I can. Please try to remain calm.”

Because she’s back in the ice box, and she feels like she’s dying all over again.

_ “Manual override initiated. Cryogenic stasis suspended.” _

She collapses (she’s fallen to her knees in front of Kellogg  _ three  _ times now - she hates herself for it) and can only watch silently, fat, wet tears falling down her cheeks as the sirens begin and Kellogg’s voice filters through.

“I was now the Institutes main operator in the Commonwealth - if they needed something done, they came to me.”

“Please,  _ please no  _ \- no don’t - please don’t  _ do this - _ ”

“It wasn’t usual for anybody from the Institute to come along on a mission - that’s why this one stood out.”

“Don’t fucking  _ do this,  _ Amari -  _ Amari  _ let me  _ out! Amari, goddamnit, let me out!” _

“I didn’t know then who it was we were grabbing from the Vault. Of course, neither did they. Not really.”

_ “Please!” _

But Amari’s not  _ there  _ anymore and Annie’s  _ trapped  _ inside her worst nightmare.

“Vault computers are still working - that’s good. Checking through the logs. Hopefully it’s all…”

“The eggheads never liked taking orders from a dirty, contaminated degenerate like  _ me  _ \- but they  _ needed  _ me. And I made sure they  _ knew it. _ ”

They’re typing, now, and Annie’s scrambling, begging to whatever gods are out there to just fucking  _ kill her,  _ to make it  _ stop,  _ to let her have a break from all the  _ shit  _ she deals with late at night, let her not relive a nightmare in the daylight - because the day is supposed to be  _ safe. _

“Pod C6. Down the hall, near the end.”

They’re walking forward, low, deliberate steps, and it’s like a funeral procession, it’s like a parade - it’s like Annie’s losing her mind bit by bit.

“This is the one, here.”

_ “Open it.” _

Annie faintly registers that she’s screaming, that her muscles are tensing and clenching, that she’s launched herself forward so that she’s lying at the base of Ritchie’s cryopod - and then she’s watching herself dethaw, struggle, and fight - and then there’s  _ Ritchie,  _ holding her baby boy in his arms and they’re so alive, out of reach, breathing and  _ real  _ and Annie is  _ crying. _

Crying as she reaches out for her husband (ex-husband, her brain reminds her), crying as her hands slip through him, through her  _ son,  _ like she’s an apparition - like  _ she’s  _ the dead one.

God, does she wish it’d been her holding Shaun.

He  _ coughs,  _ and it’s so human, so  _ alive  _ of him that Annie’s stunned into silence, and the Vault is silent - because they’re all holding their breath, watching the man out of time wake up, while his wife smacks the glass behind them.

“Is - Is it over? Are w-”

His chest swells, and Shaun coos in his arms - and Annie can’t help the smile that breaks over her anguished features, can’t help but run her fingers through their son’s hair -

Kellogg’s voice cuts through the moment, and she shakes, barely restrained rage and her eyes never leaving Shaun’s tiny body.

“I’m glad I didn’t have to kill the kid -”

If he had laid a  _ single  _ finger on Shaun, Annie would find what remained of his family and made them suffer  _ too. _

“- I’m not saying I’ve never done it, but I never like to… and yeah, I guess it did remind me of  _ her.  _ I’m a cold-hearted bastard for sure, but I’m still human.”

To that? To that Annie  _ laughs,  _ shrill and manic because there is no way she is the same species as  _ Kellogg. _

No, he isn’t human.

She refuses to let him be.

“Better this way, though. Better than taking his kid and leaving him alive.”

It hits her, suddenly, that this is the moment, or just about to be.

The moment she dies.

The moment  _ he  _ dies.

The moment everything came apart with the gun she now carries on her hip.

“-e okay?”

And then Ritchie is talking again, and Annie revels in the last few moments she has with him (even though they’re both ghosts, now.)

“Almost. Everything’s gonna be  _ fine. _ ”

But is it? Is it really, Kellogg? Because to her, to Annie, it will never be  _ fine  _ again.

“Come here - come here, baby.”

And then they’re taking her  _ son,  _ and Ritchie, lithe but strong, is grappling for Shaun, hard anger as they try and steal him away -

“No, wait - I’ve got him. I’ve  _ got  _ him -”

“Let the boy  _ go. _ I’m only gonna tell you  _ once. _ ”

“I’m not letting you take Shaun!”

The shot goes off, and Annie looks away, meets her own eyes as time stops, and Kellogg’s voice breaks into her mind once more.

“Even then… I knew it was a mistake leaving her alive. I understood that kind of revenge, no one better.”

_ Revenge.  _ Such a simple word for what she’d done to him. She’d taken her power-fist and beat his skull in, taken knives to his ligaments and his face to hamburger meat. She’d killed him three times over, and Nick had to carry her out of the old Fort.

_ Revenge,  _ what a  _ simple  _ fucking word.

“But I was cocky, enough to assume I could handle some - some soft, Pre-War Vault dweller, even  _ if  _ she somehow managed to get thawed out.”

He was cocky, when he saw her. All jokes and silly arguments, and tantalizing snippets and allusions to the whereabouts of her  _ son.  _ She’d played the game, kept her anger in check, until they’d reached the end of their rat race, until they opened fire and Annie ignored every laser burn that charred her flesh, every clack and click of the Gen-1’s as they tried to kill her. Played the game as she turned into a  _ predator,  _ let out that old anger from 200-some years ago, and chased Kellogg down, ripped the Stealthboy from his fingers and broke every one in the process.

“At least I know those Institute bastards will soon get what’s coming to them too - if she could take me out, then they won’t be able to hide from her for long.”

Time resumes, and Shaun wails, and Annie’s eyes are dark as she bites her lip hard enough to draw blood, begs for forgiveness from Ritchie’s corpse as she turns away, unable to stand the sight of her husband’s blood splattering the inside of that frozen coffin once more.

“God _ damnit!  _ Get the kid out of here, and let’s  _ go! _ ”

Kellogg turns to Annie’s pod, and that  _ fucking  _ smirk burns through her memory -

“At least we still have the  _ back up. _ ”

_ “Cryogenic sequence reinitialized.” _

Amari’s voice finally breaks through, and it’s like she’s speaking through a layer of static and cotton balls, “I'm, uh.... I'm sorry you had to go through that again. I've found another intact memory. Whenever… whenever you're ready.”

Annie doesn’t know if she’ll  _ ever  _ be ready, but she moves on anyways.


	16. memory brick road

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The sound of a baby crying can cause side-effects.

The first thing she hears is  _ Travis,  _ and it’s so achingly familiar that, for a moment, the tension from her shoulders fades, and Annie can pretend she’s on the road with Deacon once more.

And then she turns.

And then she freezes.

And then she stops breathing.

Annie reaches forward, presses her knuckles to her mouth as she kneels in front of the little boy, inhales sharply as she recognizes the slant of his eyes, the soft freckles that dot over his nose - a mirror to her own. Smiles gently as she recognizes the wrinkle of his nose and the color of his hair -

_ “Shaun.” _

The word bursts past her lips, and Annie feels like she’s floating, like she’s on cloud nine - until she realizes that something is very, very wrong.

“Is that... your son? This appears to be a very recent memory, so... good news, I think.”

Yes, that is her  _ son _ , that is her  _ blood _ , that is her will to  _ live  _ -

But this little boy is  _ ten,  _ and the cold shock of Kellogg’s long-dead words runs through her once more, the memories crashing down on her like a cold tidal wave of grief.

_ “And there she is. The most resilient woman in the Commonwealth.” _

Annie can remember the whirring of Nick’s fans as he picked up on her agitation, the way the Gen 1’s teeth shone through their plastic gums. She can remember the arrogant smirk that didn’t quite reach Kellogg’s eyes, the way he looked at her with  _ pity,  _ like he knew something she didn’t (and he did, back then.)

_ “Where is my son? Where's Shaun?” _

Her voice was even, steady, belying the panic that bubbled just under her tongue. Nick at her back and her eyes trained on Kellogg like a vulture. A hawk, maybe - the world, the Gen 1’s that surrounded them, it all fell away in a freefall dive as her fingers itched to pistol whip the mercenary  _ scum  _ and torture the truth from him.

But they were playing a  _ game,  _ and the rules had to be followed.

_ “Hmph. Lady, I'm just a puppet like you. My stage is a little bigger, that's all - Shaun's a good kid. So maybe he's not quite a "baby" anymore… but he's doing great. Only he's not here. He's with the people pulling the strings.” _

_ “Then you're going to take me to him. Right now.” _

His laugh startled her, made her eyes narrow and her teeth grind in her locked jaw. Made her blood boil and old scars burn like they were fresh.

Made her angrier than she'd been in a long while.  


_ “Take you to him? Ha ha ha ha ha. Like I could, even if I wanted to. Don't you get it? Your son, he's in a place nobody can reach.” _

And then he sighed, pinched the bridge of his nose and uttered the words that would send Annie reeling for  _ weeks. _

_ “Shaun's  _ safe _ . At  _ home _ . In the  _ Institute _ .” _

The fucking  _ Institute.  _ The one place in the Commonwealth that nobody wanted to go - even if they knew where it  _ was.  _ The boogeymen had her  _ son  _ and Annie could hardly  _ breathe  _ for the fear that struck her heart.

_ “The Institute? Well, I'll find him, no matter where he is. Nothing will stop me.” _

And nothing  _ would  _ stop her. She came into this broken world with a 10mm and radroach guts in her hair, nothing to show but the tear tracks that coursed down her filthy face and a broken home.

Nothing -  _ nobody  _ would stop her, no, she wouldn’t let them.

_ “Ha! That's the spirit. You know, you surprise me, I have to admit. I find myself actually kind of... liking you. But  _ God _ , you're persistent. I give you credit. It's the way a parent should act. The way I'd be acting if I were in your place, I like to think. Even if it is useless.” _

Annie bared her teeth in an approximation of a smile, enough to gain a chuckle from Kellogg, before she sighed, biting back retorts as he continued on - no, his time would come soon enough. They both knew it - they could both  _ feel  _ it.

_ “But I think we've been talking long enough. We both know how this has to end. So... you ready?” _

_ “I hope, when I die, I go to Hell. That way, I can kill you one more time.” _

He laughs once more, and the first shot rings out then transforms into the familiar sound of a boot hitting a door, jarring Annie back to the present.

“Kellogg.”

Black leather and sunglasses enter her field of vision, and Annie tenses as Shaun looks to Kellogg, to fucking  _ Kellogg,  _ for comfort.

“It's okay.”

He’s so - so  _ throwaway  _ about his comfort, so clinical and alien, but Shaun relaxes and goes back to watching TV, and Annie nearly  _ howls  _ for the pain that it causes her - but now he’s talking to the leather-and-sunglasses man, and Annie realizes that it is  _ direly  _ important that she pays attention.

“One of these days you're going to get your head blown off, just barging in here like that.”

(The name  _ Courser  _ whispers in her ear, and Annie shudders. This is no  _ synth,  _ this is a  _ hunter _ .)

“Minimizing my exposure to civilians is a priority.”

It sounds so… so matter of fact. Like everything it does is for a reason. Like it’s only directive is to not waste time. Like a panther, dressed up in human clothes.

“So what's the big crisis this time?”

And Kellogg sounds so tired, so on edge, and his eyes keep flicking to Shaun in a semblance of worry - like he’s  _ his  _ son, not just the byproduct of his murderous ways.

It makes Annie  _ sick. _

“New orders for you. One of our scientists has left the Institute. We know he's hiding somewhere in the Glowing Sea. Here's his file.”

A pause, a moment between their communication, before Kellogg puffs out a little exclamation of air, surprise and disbelief in his eyes, “ _ Wow _ . Some heads are going to roll for this. Capture and return or just elimination?”

“Elimination. He was working on a highly classified program.”

“No kidding. One of the top Bioscience boys? Damn.”

Another pause, and Annie clenches her fists, feeling the shift in the air and  _ hating  _ it, hating  _ him  _ for it - because he cares for her son, for Shaun, and Annie feels like crying when she realizes that he’s gotten ten years with him, ten years that she’ll never get back.

“So... I guess you're taking the kid back with you.”

“Affirmative. Your only mission is to locate and eliminate Virgil.”

And then Shaun stands, takes the Courser’s hand, like they’re friends, like he doesn’t realize the danger he’s in. As if he doesn’t have a worry in the world, as if he didn’t know that his real parents (parent, her brain reminds her) were mourning in a cryopod over their (her) loss.

“Bye, Mr. Kellogg! I hope I'll see you again sometime!”

A flash of light, blue, startling, clear,  _ clean -  _ and they’re both gone.

The room seems so much darker, without Shaun in it. And Kellogg seems so much more tired, without Shaun near him.

“... Bye.”

Amari’s voice breaks through, like the cresting and calling of angels, as Annie turns to the TV, emblazoned with the Vault-Tec logo, and static fuzzes through her eyes as the lullaby of Amari’s speech brings her back out, all lighthearted joy and scientific enjoyment, “Teleportation! Now it all makes sense. Nobody's found the entrance to the Institute because there  _ is  _ no entrance!”

The static turns black, and Annie resuscitates.


	17. feeling human

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annie's not quite sure if she's any better than Kellogg.

Deacon and Nick are gone when Annie wakes up, or at least she _ thinks _ they are, because as soon as the first wheezing sob breaks through her lips at the lack of their presence, at the overwhelming feeling of _ grief _ , Deacon is there, an omnipotent presence in her peripherals, and Nick is still gone, yes, but Deacon is there as Annie curls in on herself and just _ feels, _ relishes in the ability to _ release _ all the _ pain, _if only for a moment.

She can’t remember the last time she cried like this (other than in the memory lounger, but that doesn’t count), can’t remember the last time she was this raw, vulnerable.

Can’t remember the last time she let herself be something resembling _ human, _ can’t remember the last time she was this _ weak. _

(Deacon’s winning again, she faintly realizes, because now he’s got abject terror and grief and shame, and all those things she thought she’d gotten over after waking up 200 years later.)

“Your -”

Dr. Amari, _ Amari, _ speaks up in the silence, presses a gentle, well worn hand on Annie’s shoulder, rubs the bone in a tender sort of way (like how Deacon, _ Gregory, _had done for Audrey) and the look she gives Annie is downright melancholic, “Your memories of Vault 111... I'm so sorry we put you through that again.”

Annie’s voice is small, jagged edges and broken glass, compared to her usual cool charm, “It’s okay. Did -”

Amari steamrollers on, looking away with a sigh as she retracts her hand after a moment, clearly uncomfortable with prolonged contact.

“You've been through so much. I hope you find some peace one day.”

“When -”

Her voice breaks, and Annie shudders, collecting herself with a sniffle and a shrug - then she looks up, and a strangled sort of smile finds its way onto her face.

“My _ son _.”

“What about him, Charmer?”

\--

When he speaks, he can see Charmer tense up, see the telltale signs of trauma and grief, things he knows so intimately - it’s heart wrenching, to say the least.

And when she speaks, _ God, _it sounds like a eulogy, like the last rites of a funeral. She’s all twisted expressions and weepy eyes, a mother lost and untethered in the wastes.

(He’s seen too many women just like her, but Deacon never imagined seeing Charmer this fucked up. She seemed invincible, unbreakable - this was wrong, this was a side he’d only glanced in the middle of the night, or out of the corner of his eye.)

“My son. He’s - he’s ten years old.”

\--

_ There. _ She’s _ said it. _

It takes all of her strength and then some to not burst into tears again, not to crumble and crack under the weight of their eyes, the sharp inhale of air that flits through Deacon’s too-perfect-teeth - she needs to, needs to -

Annie doesn’t really know what she needs, not anymore.

(She needs her _ son, _ safe and back in her arms, happy and alive and away from the _ Institute. _)

She looks to Deacon, but he won’t meet her eyes, instead pulling at a loose thread on his shirt (why won’t he look at her?) and clearing his throat with a start, “I - uh, I’m gonna go do some recon. I’ll be back.”

And then he’s gone too, and she feels like bursting into tears again, instead settling for a wheeze and an attempt at getting out of the memory lounger.

“Woah - woah, slow movements, okay? I don't know what kind of side effects the procedure might have had. No one's ever... done this before,” Amari steadies her with quick hands and a grimace, helps her into a patio chair with cracked paint and a threadbare cushion, “How do you feel?”

“I’d hope not,” Annie offers up a wan smile, hoping she doesn’t look as shitty as she feels, but Amari’s concerned look begins to dash those hopes against the rocks, “Am I okay? Does that mean - are you seeing anything... bad?”

“Don't be alarmed, but I honestly don't know what to look for. As I said before, this is uncharted territory. But, your neural and physiological readings have returned to normal. From a medical standpoint, you're fine.”

“That’s… _ good, _” Annie is hesitant, before groaning as the pain sets in, a low burning in the back of her head, behind her eyes, just like when her old studio producer carved her -

She shakes her head, and promptly regrets it as the pain kicks up another notch, as the burning doubles and then triples, bringing soft tears pricking at the corners of her eyes, “I have this… burning feeling inside my skull. It's like it's on fire… that’s not normal, is it?”

“That's not surprising. All the synapses in your brain have just been pulled apart, connected to someone else, and then pulled back together.”

Pulled apart, put back together - that’s oddly ironic, considering how many times she’s remade herself for the silver screen, how many times she put herself under the knife for her husband’s sake.

“I injected you with a large Stimpak while I was pulling you out. That should ease things.”

“Thank you,” She’s so liberal with her words, with the truth, honesty pouring from her every annunciation. It’s so foreign, so strange, compared to the lies and secrecy of her time working with the Railroad.

“Are you... ready to talk about what happened in there?”

“I don’t know if I’ll _ ever _ be ready, but I think,” Annie pauses, inhales and steadies her breathing, “But I think I’m stable, okay enough to - to _ discuss _it.”

“That’s… good.”

Amari is so gentle, like Annie’s a child, like she’s not triple, quadruple, quintuple the good doctor’s age, and it nearly breaks her all over again.

“I saw Kellogg's life… The man who ruined my family… The man I killed…” 

“That's right. He was a human being just like the rest of us, and he had reasons for being what he was, however cruel.”

“He wasn’t _ human, _” the words bite past her lips, and Annie looks scandalized, if only for a moment, “I’m - sorry.”

“It’s alright, you’ve been through quite a lot. How does that… make you feel?”

“It's convinced me that I did the right thing. He was a rabid dog, and he needed to be put down. But, it… it wasn't all his fault. I can't blame him for everything that happened. Does that make me - does that make me a bad person, Doctor?”

“No, I’d say… I’d say it just makes you human - still, we're getting off-track. The important thing is that we discovered the Institute's greatest secret. Teleportation.”

Her mind turns to more important things, to plans and details and the knowledge she’s scoured from a dead man’s brain, away from emotions and fickle feelings, “We got what we needed. The Institute uses teleportation to get in and out.”

“_ Yes. _The only question is, what do we do now?”

“That scientist Kellogg was supposed to track down. _ Virgil _. We need to find him.”

Virgil, a target, a man hunted by Coursers and her very own nightmare.

“Where did the memory say he was? The Glowing Sea? That can't be right. No one would risk going there. Not even to hide.”

“Why?”

“Because - because it’s the _ Glowing Sea. _The name says it all. Radiation. So much that nothing there could possibly live. Nothing pleasant, that is,” the fear in Amari’s voice is real, and it strikes a note in Annie’s heart that resounds with it. She didn’t even have the caps to - to survive the _ regular _fucking Commonwealth, so how the hell was she -

“Navigating radioactive hazards is nothing new, but the Glowing Sea can kill a man in seconds. That's why it doesn't make sense. Virgil fleeing into that hell. The exposure alone…” 

Annie sighs, pinches the bridge of her nose as she thinks over the implications of Amari’s statement, “Then he's dead already. It's a waste of time.”

“No. He must have gone there for a reason. He has to be alive. He… must have been prepared for it… Look, we don't have any options left. You _ have _ to go after him. Through that sea of - of radioactive _ ash _.”

Inspiration strikes like a yao guai, and Annie’s spine straightens like an iron rod as the ideas start to connect, “That's why he's there. To make the Institute think twice about following him - I mean, what _ better _place to hide than the one place no one can survive in?”

“That must be it! He's using the radiation in the Glowing Sea like a shield or a - a cloak… a way to throw them off and be at an advantage.” 

“Nothing is ever easy - If we need to find Virgil, then I'm going after him.”

“If you're going to go, be prepared. You'll need some way to combat the radiation there. It's called the Glowing Sea for a reason.”

“I'll find a way to get through the rads. Don't worry.”

Annie stands, offers Amari her hand and words of thanks, before turning and looking to the doorway, “Is he…?”

“I unplugged Mister Valentine first. Removed the implant while you were waking up. He's waiting for you upstairs.”

“Thank you.”

“Of course. Good luck and… stay safe.”


	18. bend and break

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ajshklfdjh rlly short chapter this time yall ;;;;; sorry in advance!!!!!  
we're rlly getting into the meat (read: angst) again in a couple chapters, but i wanted to finish up the dangerous minds questline on a semi positive note!!!!  
(furthermore, im excited for all of you to read the next couple of chapters, we get some FLUFF yall....Thrive)

Nick is, in fact, waiting for Annie upstairs, reclining stiffly on one of Irma’s overstuffed armchairs. He’s so - so  _ alien  _ in this environment, the hard lines of his cheeks and rough voice are more suited for the wastes, for Diamond City.

She’s speeding to his side in a second, wiping the last remains of her meltdown from her face, obliterating her moment of weakness into dust, “Nick - Nicky, are you alright?”

“Hope you got what you were looking for inside my head. Heh. I was right. Should've killed you when you were on ice.”

Kellogg’s voice is like a bad vocoder sample, like the IBX meets unholy amalgamation of tech, and it sets Annie on edge instantly, taking a step back with a look of horror, of tragedy, “Get - get the  _ fuck  _ out of my friend, Kellogg. I killed you once, I’ll do it again.”

“What are you talking about?” Nick blinks, shaking his head as the smirk falls, and a look of concern replaces it, clawed hand reaching out to take Annie’s soft, warm one, “Are you okay kid?”

“Did - It’s… nothing. Are  _ you  _ okay, Nick?”

“Yeah, yeah, just the old processor’s a little foggy.”

“I… see.”

Silence falls between them, and Annie squeezes Nick’s hand, sitting next to him on the overly plush couch with a gentle sigh, “Nick - Nick can I get your advice?”

He chuckles, and squeezes her hand back - it’s always been obvious (at least to her) that he’s surprised at how easily she accepts the metal bits of him, the glaringly obvious inhuman details, “Shoot, kid.”

“I’m afraid,” it feels so  _ good  _ to say that, like an admission of guilt - it feels so good, in fact, that it should be considered  _ criminal, _ “I’m afraid of what I have to do. I’m - I’m going up against the most dangerous people of the Commonwealth. I have to fight the goddamn  _ boogeyman.  _ How do I… How do I even deal with this?”

“Well,” he takes a moment, adjusts his ragged fedora over his bald skull before continuing, “I suppose you just take it a day at a time. Focus on the next step, and have a good partner at your back.”

Annie nods, solemn as a grave, before looking to the doors that lead outside, “I don’t know if I’m strong enough.”

And it’s  _ true,  _ is the worst part of her admission. Every person has their breaking point and Annie can feel herself creeping ever closer to the precipice, watch the rocks crumble under her feet as she loses touch with herself.

(Maybe that’s why she’s still keeping tally, a stupid game to keep her grounded.)

“You don’t have to be - that’s why you’ve got  _ us.  _ Kid, half the ‘Wealth is is under your thumb, and don’t you play coy, because we both know it’s true. You shout, we’ll come running, okay?”

“Okay,” the word leaves her oddly empty, numb, and she wipes away the last few tears with a small sniffle, “Thank you, Nick.”

“No, thank  _ you,  _ kid. I’m sure the Institute’s quaking in its boots right about now.”

Annie laughs, and Nick chuckles, and for a moment she can pretend that nothing is wrong.


	19. nuclear winter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> as promised;;;;; FLUFF,...,,,,,,., it took me Forever 2 rlly get this how i wanted it but... Yall.... .YALL IM TENDER,,,

They leave Goodneighbor with laughter and lighthearted jokes, the soft light of neon and the tell-tale green of an impending radstorm at their backs as Annie consults her Pip-Boy for the road home: they’re not too far, but they’ve already passed by the old Mass Fusion building, which is riddled with ghouls - which makes the hardest part of their journey (hopefully) done and over with. Not the easiest route, nor the quickest, but just gentle enough on her that she doesn’t risk opening up any of her still healing wounds.

The laser burn on her thigh still itches, healing slow enough that Annie secretly despises it.

“Burn acting up?”

Well, maybe not so secretly.

“Yeah. Kinda,” the slang, the imperfect words, they fall so easily from her lips around Deacon - it’d be frightening, if she didn’t have so much faith in him, “Do you think we should make camp?”

Deacon cocks his head to the side, thumb smoothing over the gentle stubble of his chin, as Annie continues on, “I know we’ve just gone by Mass Fusion, and that this isn’t the _ best _ area, but it’s got good cover and one of these buildings looks like good shelter - _ especially _since the storm’s getting closer.”

“Yeah, yeah - I know Charmer, I can smell the ozone from here. I’m just - considering the logistics. I mean, we can push it and hoof it back to base, maybe, but that risks the storm. And if we stay here, we’re risking getting eaten alive by ghouls.”

Annie shudders, voice small as she can only imagine the thought of a feral sinking its teeth into her, “Do - do they _ really _eat people?”

To that, Deacon laughs, a _ proper _laugh - all soft moving shoulders and bright teeth, grinning cheekily at her flustered expression once she realizes she’s being had.

“Ass.”

“You know you love it.”

“Maybe,” Annie turns to the buildings on their right, eyeing up boarded up doors with apprehension - she turns back to Deacon, after a moment, holstering her .44 and snagging the lead pipe she keeps for ‘emergencies,’ “What do you think?”

He takes it from her with another one of his trademark smirks, pulling off plywood like it’s nothing - his answer is clear as day.

She thinks he says something to her as he works, but Annie’s too busy admiring his musculature to respond. He’s strong, that much is obvious, but the way the muscles move in his back with every twisting movement - it’s _ entrancing. _She’s half tempted to reach out, drag her fingers down his spine, feel him flex and tense up beneath her touch, half tempted to catch his arm with a gentle touch, to take his hand in hers and feel those calloused hands soothing her stress away once more -

She’s tempted to do a lot of things to Deacon, not that she’ll ever act on them.

He repeats himself, after a moment, and Annie shakes her head, bringing herself back to the present with an absentminded smile, “What was that?”

“Nothing, nothing - c’mon, Charmer. Radstorm won’t wait for us to get inside, so let’s book it.”

Annie rolls her eyes as she follows him in, smacking his shoulder with a soft chuckle - she anticipates, _ appreciates, _ his antics, no matter how annoyed she may seem.

(He knows this, she doesn’t know _ how, _ he just _ does. _)

Annie’s careful not to stub her toe on the debris that litters the floor - its a basic apartment, that much is for sure, outfitted with a fancy kitchen, a couple of couches, and a bathroom. Maybe a bedroom too, but they’ve yet to get beyond the threshold.

“What do you think, Mr. Deacon?”

“I think it rivals the Dugout in terms of hospitality.”

Annie belts out a laugh, snorting at his snark, before giving him a cheeky grin in return, “You’re too mean, Vadim tries his best.”

“Vadim threatened to cut my hand off if I -”

Deacon pauses, ears red as he coughs into his fist, mumbling something too quiet for her to hear. Annie’s, obviously, intrigued, and continues to pester him as they check the apartment over for ferals and vermin.

“Why’d he threaten that?”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“Oh, come on Deacon, we both know Vadim wouldn’t do that if it ‘didn’t matter’. What’s the big secret?”

“There’s no big secret, Charmer.”

“I think you’re ly-ing.”

She speaks with a sing-song note in her voice, laughing as he scowls.

“I’m not _ ly-ing, _Charmer - or maybe I am. Who knows.”

He takes that same tone with her, coming in close, close enough that their noses are nearly touching, smirking with raised eyebrows - annoyance etches over his face. Playful annoyance, but annoyance all the same.

It takes them no time at all, going from room to room and exterminating the few pests they find (nothing major, luckily. There’s not enough time to find a different shelter), and Annie sighs, dropping the topic with a disappointed grumble, before perking up upon noticing an adjoining bedroom, “We could probably use whatever’s in there to help seal us in, don’t you think?”

He nods, and they go to work, and before she can protest, Deacon has Annie helping him push the ruined bedframe up against the door (the stress pulls uncomfortably on the laser burn), using the practically shredded mattress to block the broken windows (stretching her arms up pulls at a recent bullet wound, making her hiss), and the bathtub curtain to seal what few cracks they find.

“I think this is pretty good - what do you say, oh great and mighty Deacon?”

It’s _ his _turn to roll his eyes, even though they still remain hidden behind ever-present sunglasses - he still obliges her with a smile, sinking comfortably into the old, dusty couch (Annie sneezes, which makes him laugh and her scowl), “I think it’s pretty good, all in all.”

She nods and pops her knuckles, and after a moment, she sits down next to him, letting the tension fall away from her in one relieved groan.

“Radstorms always make my head hurt.”

“The radiation will do that.”

She shoots Deacon a quick glare, nudging his foot with hers, as she pulls her bag towards her, searching through it for her reserve food, “Not like that - I’ve never been _ around _radiation, remember? I’m… squeaky clean, I suppose? I’m just not used to it.”

“I get that. I’m kinda envious, honestly,” he muses, eyeing her curiously, “What was it like?”

She’s silent, still digging through her pack, and after a moment, he nudges her foot, eyebrows raised in a silent question.

“It was…” Annie trails off, pinching the bridge of her nose, before pulling two preserved containers from the bowels of her bag, grinning in delight as she sees that nothing leaked through, “It was the same, I guess.”

“What, all bombed-out and filled with raiders?” Deacon quiets as she holds out a plastic spoon and one of the tupperware to him, taking it with a soft smile, opening the lid and whistling in appreciation as the smell of homemade stew hits his nose, “You can cook?”

Annie snorts, popping open her own food, setting it on the floor for a moment as she pulls out two relatively unscathed bottles of Nuka-Cola, offering him one with a shrug, “Of _ course _ I can cook. I only wish more had survived, then I’d treat you to a _ real _meal.”

“Is that a promise?”

“I don’t joke about food, Deacon.”

“Then it’s a date!”

She reddens, shakes his flippant words off with a nod, and nibbles at the squirrel stew with a soft smile - her appetite is smaller than it used to be, and she fishes a cigarette from her pocket, lighting it up and inhaling deep after a moment. She uses the smoke as a mask, turning her head just enough to look at Deacon - she meets his eyes (or so she hopes) before asking, “Why _ do _you want to know about how it used to be?”

“Call it curiosity.”

Something doesn’t sit right, but the radstorm’s making her head feel stuffy, and the stew’s good enough to make her relax, and the nicotine pulses through her and lets her walls fall a little bit, and now she’s nudging Deacon’s foot again, as if they were both elementary schoolers playing some sort of intricate game.

“It was - _ bright. _ Always bright. The cities had so much light, you could barely see the moon… for miles outside of them, it was hard to pick out the stars. And cars - the cars were always so _ fast. _I could drive from here to Sanctuary in less than an hour.”

Deacon snorts, leaning forward, resting his elbows on his knees, “I’m calling bullshit, Charmer.”

“It’s true!” Annie laughs, setting her food off to the side, taking another large drink of the Nuka-Cola soon after, “And the _ seasons - _ God, do I miss spring. _ Green _ and _ wet _ and full of _ life. _Summer was always so hot, but the pool was such a beautiful place, all shimmering water and suntans.”

He’s _ enraptured, _ hanging on to her every word as if it’s gospel, and Annie’s scooting closer without really meaning to, offering him the cigarette with an earnest expression - she’s still got the Nuka in her free hand, drinking it down to dregs soon enough, “I _ loved _ autumn, you know that? The leaves would just - just _ fall _ off the trees, reds and oranges and yellows, like fire. They’d crunch under your feet, and it was _ just _cold enough to wear a coat, finally.”

“And the air was so crisp - so clean. The cleanest part of the year, when it was _ almost _ cold enough to hurt,” he accepts her offering, takes a slow puff, tongue darting out to wet chapped lips, and Annie’s stumbling through memories and the Nuka-Cola is making her tongue feel thick in her mouth, making everything blur together - she always swore they put something in the soda, but there’s something about Deacon that brings out its effects in such a _ different _ way, the soft haze of sugar making her numb, “I _ craved _ autumn, I _ adored _ it - it was my _ favorite _time of the year. You could use the fireplace, chapstick in every flavor imaginable - I still have a tube at Sanctuary, now that I think of it - and the drinks, all themed with the seasons.”

His eyes are on her mouth now, curved up into a sly little smile, and she’s nearly _ draped _over Deacon - she presses her hand into the seat of the couch, watching the forgotten cigarette burn to ashes, barely keeping its shape. Deacon swallows thickly, Adam’s apple bobbing in the hard curve of his throat - Annie’s smile softens out as she inclines her head in the direction of the cigarette, hanging limply from the corner of Deacon’s mouth.

“You gonna finish that?”

He inhales, sharp, as her hand creeps up to rest against his cheek, fingernails tracing down, down, until she snags the cigarette from him, taking a hit with a lazy smile.

(Her bottle of Nuka hits the floor, bouncing gently against her bag, muffled noise by all the old carpeting.)

“You -”

“Yeah?”

She doesn’t know how she ended up with her mouth nearly touching his, how she ended up speaking words into his air - how she ended up with his hands on her waist, her whole body on fire.

Deacon swallows again, and she barely skims her lips over his, just enough contact that it sends shocks through her, like she’s 19 and having her first kiss again.

Like she’s not kissing her dead husband’s doppelganger.

Annie pulls back, suddenly, eyes wide as an apology starts to bubble on her lips - Deacon silences her, quick as a whip, pressing his hands to her cheeks and smoothing his thumb over the shining scar that mars her face.

Deacon pulls her in, gently, carefully, like their both broken glass and sandpaper, until their foreheads are pressed together - comfortable, quiet.

He pulls her in, until she’s resting up against his chest, fingers tangled in his shirt as the cigarette extinguishes, and all they have left is the soft glow of her Pip-Boy.

Pulls her in, fingers smoothing through her tangled hair, soothing her aches and pains and the tightness from the radiation with just his touch.

Pulls her in, until they’re both falling asleep, wrapped in the other’s embrace.


	20. who am i to judge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a chapter with ONLY deacons pov????? wow.....   
with the radstorm still raging, deacon's conflicted, and the stakes get a little higher !!!!!!!   
the next few chapters are going to continue along this line....but soon, the first affinity talk will happen! buckle up!

Deacon wakes up before Annie, as per the norm - what’s  _ not  _ normal is the fact she’s lying across him, curled up and tucked into the pocket of his arm, hair mussed up and falling across her face.

For a moment, she looks like Barbara, and Deacon’s heart twists; whether in sympathy to Annie’s own struggles in grieving, or because he wishes she was someone else, or for some unknown reason, he doesn’t know.

He runs his fingers through her hair, looking up at the ceiling with bated breath as she grumbles, twisting her hands deeper into the warmth of his shirt - his heart swells, and Deacon clenches his jaw, teeth grinding together.

Because he can’t get tangled up like this, can’t let her screw herself over with him.

Deacon sighs, resting his head back on the arm of the couch - how long can he keep up the game? How long can he survive?

How long until she gets rid of him?

How long until she dies too?

He makes to move away from her, but her tired eyes flutter, and the signs of radiation sickness are as clear as day; her skin is too pale, her freckles standing out like beacons on her face, disappearing down the curve of her neck, under the soft t-shirt she’d scavenged, and her eyes are puffy, red-rimmed and clenched tight - or maybe that’s just from crying. 

What kind of monster leaves someone like that alone?

He’s careful when he moves her arm, new scars angry and pink, old scars silver and shining (Deacon wonders how she got them, she hasn’t been awake all that long, and these look years old), craning his neck to glance at the time, which her Pip-Boy helpfully displays in a blaze of sickly, neon green.

_ 5:27 am.  _

He groans softly, flinging his free arm over his eyes, grimacing at the cold bite of the sunglasses’ nose piece digging into his skin. 

It’s so  _ goddamned  _ early, and he can’t find it within himself to wake her.

(He remembers how she looked, leaving the Memory Den with a look of detached agony. Like someone was cutting into her, but she couldn’t find it within herself to care.

How she leaned into him the whole way back to the gate, the way tears pricked at her eyes whenever she started to soften - the way she grabbed his hand and held it in a death grip.

The way she joked and laughed, her eyes betraying her inner feelings.

He remembers how she kept looking at something in her pocket, as if to reassure herself it was still there.)

“Deacon…?”

Her voice is so soft, so quiet, for a moment Deacon thinks he’s imagined it - but then her sleep-addled face scrunches up, and she groans, rolling over and mashing her face into his chest.

“Deacon.”

It’s just his name, but it sets him on edge - and it doesn’t even  _ sound  _ like his name, anyways. It’s half-muffled and nearly unintelligible, slurred speech and exhaustion, but it’s still his  _ name. _

He grunts, patting her shoulder in an approximation of comfort, before shifting into a more comfortable position, his back and Annie herself making noises of protest.

“G’morning, Sleeping Beauty.”

“Good… morning.”

She yawns, stretching, and winces after a moment, clutching the side of her head with a look of distaste, “Radstorm. M’head hurts - it hasn’t passed yet, has it?”

“Nope.”

Deacon pops the last syllable of the word, pretending like she’s still not draped on top of him like a blanket, her hair all mussed and half hanging out of the fabric she uses as a hair-tie. Pretending like this is just a coworker thing, a  _ normal  _ thing, like he didn’t have her hanging over him, pressing a small kiss to his lips last night.

She sighs, rolling her neck with a gruesome  _ crack,  _ before pulling away from him, worrying her lip between her teeth - her makeup’s messed up too. The red on her lips trails down to her chin, the mascara of the previous day makes deep shadows under her eyes; he laughs, startling her into alertness.

“What?”

“Nothing, nothing.”

“Suuuuuure,” she drags out the word, standing in one fluid motion - she won’t meet his eyes,  _ why won’t she meet his eyes? _

Deacon doesn’t take his eyes off her, like she’s a wild Yao Guai, like she’s a Deathclaw, poised to attack. 

(She still won’t look at him.)

“You… sleep well last night?”

His words are cautious, halting, stilted and stuttering - Annie nods, silent, before using the dark screen of her Pip-Boy to tie her hair back, none of the usual teasing or expertly woven locks this time, no, just frizzy blonde tied back out of necessity. She rummages through her bag for - for  _ something,  _ for what he doesn’t know.

Then she lets out a noise of triumph, clutching two small bottles of water in her hand - dirty water, and he knew Annie well enough that she wouldn’t drink it unless the need was dire, unless they were out of purified water…

“What are you doing?”

“I need to wash my face?” She phrases the statement as a question, eyebrows up near her hairline. And then she looks at him, really,  _ truly  _ looks at him, for the first time that morning.

There’s a beat of silence, their eyes remained locked, and he turns away, nodding - when did he get so soft?

“What, too posh to scum it up with the rest of us?”

“Maybe so,” Annie laughs, then, eyes bright as she pulls out a dented pot from  _ God  _ knows where, setting it on the floor as she carefully pours the water in it as to not waste a drop.

Her back is to him, and Deacon’s struck with how intimate the setting really is (all they did way  _ kiss,  _ and it wasn’t even a  _ kiss,  _ for fuck’s sake. Just rad-fueled idiocy).

Annie’s motions are methodical, slow,  _ practiced,  _ taking a soft rag from her pocket and wetting it, before swiping it over her eyes - the water must be cold, because she hisses out her discomfort. Deacon closes his eyes, and he can almost see her in his mind’s eye, squinting as drops of it run rivulets down her cheeks. She swipes at her face again, rubbing circles into the hollows of her eyes, taking tender care around her scar, angry and alive. 

Soap comes next, he thinks, as he hears her scrub the cloth itself. She runs it over her whole face, scrunching up her nose in distaste as the bitter smell of it permeates her nostrils. The soap is set to the side, he thinks, hearing the sound of something hitting the floor - another run of the washcloth, a part that must be soap-free, before he hears her hands dip in the water and the tell-tale sounds of someone splashing water on their face.

Intricate rituals, intricate means.

Annie clears her throat, suddenly, and Deacon startles, jerking to a vertical position, head swiveling to stare at the back of her head.

“Can you hand me one of the shirts at the bottom? I don’t want to get anything wet.”

“Sure thing, Charmer,” and Deacon does as she asks, snatching up a halfway clean t-shirt from her bag, suddenly highly aware of how  _ twisted  _ she’s got him.

No, not twisted.  _ Unraveled. _

She takes it from him with a grateful, yet sopping, smile, eyes squinted up as to not get water in them - this might be the first time he’s seen her without makeup, he thinks.

Her freckles stand out the most.

Sure, last night the radiation made them apparent, but when she’s not sickly, they stand out less, mesh with her face more. Her scar’s much more prominent, too. Red and angry. The small holes from a needle shine soft, dulled by the brilliance of the main injury.

Deacon wonders how she got it.

Deacon wonders if he can ask.

“Thanks,” her voice breaks through his reverie, and Deacon quickly looks away, as if he’d not been just watching,  _ staring,  _ intently at her as she’d dried her face. As if they were something -  _ could  _ be something.

Annie trusts Deacon too much, too much for her own good.

Too much for his safety, too.


	21. way back home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They're back at base and the storm inches ever closer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 2 chapters in one day yall >:3!!!!! we're almost to the affinity scene now, but first annie needs to talk with tom, and have some girl time with glory

On the third day, the storm breaks, and Annie and Deacon leave for HQ - raiders are plentiful in the cramped streets of Boston, and Annie is not fortunate enough to avoid their bullets, a few lodging themselves squarely in her back, and two that graze the sides of her leg.

She’s lucky, that way.

(She’s quick to duck off into the safest place she can, sewing herself up with practiced calculation - she doesn’t even have Med-X for the pain, so clenching her jaw will have to do.)

But the Old North Church isn’t far off, and she can still walk unaided, which is enough to bring a spring to her step, and a smile to her face.

Despite the… strangeness of the Railroad, she’s missed them, what with their little quirks and abrasive attitudes. Desdemona’s bluntness, Glory’s grit, Carrington’s razor-sharp tongue, Tom’s quirkiness, Drummer’s…  _ everything. _

She can’t wait to get back home.

(Because that’s what it is, isn’t it? A  _ home.  _ Somewhere she can relax and breathe and feel safe, for once.)

So when they  _ finally  _ arrive at HQ, Annie is all tired eyes and soft sighs. She gives a nod to Desdemona upon spotting her, and a careful smile at Drummer Boy, not wanting to be accosted for yet  _ another  _ mission - she loves helping them, she really,  _ truly  _ does, but Annie needs a  _ break. _

She’s so exhausted, and annoyed, and she feels like a ticking time bomb, about to explode - she needs to rest, needs a  _ vacation. _

But she has  _ responsibilities,  _ and being an agent has never been easy.

“Deacon?”

“That’s my name, don’t wear it out!”

She laughs, light and gentle, before waving her hand vaguely, “I’m going to check in with everyone, maybe spend a few days here. See what PAM’s got for me, yeah? If you wanna go off on your own though, I won’t stop you.”

“And miss your delightful company?  _ Never, _ ” glib tongues and quicksilver words, indeed. Deacon stretches, cracking his vertebrae like popcorn, and gives her another cheeky grin, “I’ll be around base - just snag me if you need me, alright Charmer?”

“Of course, Mr. Deacon,” another laugh, softer, as she notices Carrington’s baleful gaze on them - she’s gotten too comfortable, that much is apparent.

Thus, her first stop is (obviously) Carrington, who clicks his tongue and gives her a look of scorn as he notices the (visible) scrapes she has, “Ahh... it's our newest agent. What brings you to my humble corner today, wait, let me guess. You rolled into a fire and got a laser burn on your thigh,  _ Again. _ ”

Annie suppresses an eye roll, gritting her teeth as she picks at a loose thread on her shirt, “Not quite. Just routine checkup, if you will? I’m not much help to the Railroad if I’m battered to hell and back.”

Carrington lets out another disdainful sigh, before gesturing to his makeshift examiner's area - no more than a shanty, really. Patched curtains, running from pillar to pillar, to obscure the patient, but not much in the way of modesty.

Annie, obviously, hated it - she’d hated it since day one, it’d gone against all of her instincts, her morals, her values (but what did values matter in a society such as this?)

But she complies, not without grumbling, shuffling into the enclosed space and loosening the buckles of her leather armor, setting them carefully on the rack next to the makeshift sick cot as Carrington waits patiently outside.

Next is her shirt, she keeps her pants and decides old burns be damned, she is  _ not  _ going through the morbid embarrassment of Carrington examining her legs for wounds again, no, she’ll ask Daisy instead next time she’s in Goodneighbor.

“Alright, Carrington, let’s get this show on the road.”

“Can you be  _ any  _ slower? I’ve had pack brahmin get undressed faster than you.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment, Doctor.”

“It isn’t.”

His voice is flat, annoyed, as he inspects her back, moving her low ponytail out of the way with practiced ease - his tone gentles, after a moment, “So, how did it go?”

“Did what go?”

“The mission, of course.”

“Which one? I’ve been running MILA’s for Tom, safehouses for PAM, and then the odd thing here and there for pretty much  _ any  _ ham and egger, Carrington. You’ll have to be more specific.”

His stethoscope is like ice on her skin, and she inhales sharply with a hiss as he snickers, childish even when professional, “You know which one I mean. My prototype.”

“Oh, that one! God, Carrington, that feels like ages ago. Had some trouble with the eye, bad one, of course, and got sucker-punched in the other by a raider. Some actually took potshots at us on the way here, ironically.”

“You were shot?”

“A couple of times, that’s why the time frame is off for returning it. Nothing major.”

“Who stitched you up? These are…”

His finger presses one of the angry wounds, and she snarls, bending away with a hurt look - she doesn’t have any Med-X in her system, no Stim-paks wasted on small wounds, and Carrington could tell from the look of them, the asshole.

“I did, you tyrant. Don’t press them again - I did the best I could, you know.”

“You are a  _ menace  _ with a needle - they’ll scar.”

“I know.”

“You’re… okay with that?”

“I have to be.”

Her head hangs low, and the thought of her skin - before the war, of course - clouds her mind. Flawless. Perfect. Freckles over the boniest parts of her, all soft edges and blurred lines - she misses it.

Conversation dies, and he, Carrington, pulls out the stitches, redoes them, and gives her a clean bill of health after a cumulative 45 minutes - she’s grateful it’s over so quickly. A nod to him, a roll of her shoulders, and she slips a comfortable flannel over her frame, ducking out of the ‘office’ with another offer of thanks.

Next on her list is talking to Glory - she’s just about the only person at HQ that Annie feels truly comfortable with, like the friend she never had, like the sister she always wanted. Maybe something more.

Ritchie was never comfortable with how open her heart was, unless he got to watch.

She shudders, brushing the thought away, as she looks around, catching Deacon’s eye and giving him a wry smile.

They’ve often joked about Carrington’s ‘cruelty’, and the humor of the situation is not lost on her.

But she has  _ responsibilities,  _ and Deacon can wait (if only she could too.)


	22. notice

hey yall its ya boy... cheble!!!!! i know, i know, this fic hasnt updated in forever - i hit sort of a dead spot on it, but good news! im going to be working more this summer, and new chapters should appear pretty quickly! keep an eye out, and ill see you on the other side!


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